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Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility

Personality affects the vulnerability to the emotional symptoms of depression and anxiety. This study investigated whether stress mindset (general belief about the nature of stress) and coping flexibility (the ability to terminate ineffective coping strategies and adopt alternative ones) mediate the...

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Autores principales: Chen, Luxi, Qu, Li, Hong, Ryan Y.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9105170/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35566398
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11092272
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author Chen, Luxi
Qu, Li
Hong, Ryan Y.
author_facet Chen, Luxi
Qu, Li
Hong, Ryan Y.
author_sort Chen, Luxi
collection PubMed
description Personality affects the vulnerability to the emotional symptoms of depression and anxiety. This study investigated whether stress mindset (general belief about the nature of stress) and coping flexibility (the ability to terminate ineffective coping strategies and adopt alternative ones) mediate the relations of the Big Five personality traits to psychological distress. A total of 260 undergraduate students (60.4% female) in Singapore completed self-reported questionnaires. A series of path analyses was performed. Firstly, a dual-pathway model of stress coping was established, which consisted of (a) a stress–threat–distress pathway where a stress-is-a-threat mindset mediated the association between stressful experiences and psychological distress and (b) a challenge–flexibility–enhancement pathway where coping flexibility mediated the relation of a stress-is-a-challenge mindset to a lower level of psychological distress, without being influenced by stressful experiences. Furthermore, Neuroticism was associated with the stress–threat–distress pathway, with stressful experiences and a stress-is-a-treat mindset mediating the relation of Neuroticism to psychological distress. Conscientiousness was associated with the challenge–flexibility–enhancement pathway, with a stress-is-a-challenge mindset and coping flexibility mediating the relation of Conscientiousness to less psychological distress. Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Openness were directly associated with greater coping flexibility. The findings enrich the literature on personality and stress coping and inform future interventions to promote mental health.
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spelling pubmed-91051702022-05-14 Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility Chen, Luxi Qu, Li Hong, Ryan Y. J Clin Med Article Personality affects the vulnerability to the emotional symptoms of depression and anxiety. This study investigated whether stress mindset (general belief about the nature of stress) and coping flexibility (the ability to terminate ineffective coping strategies and adopt alternative ones) mediate the relations of the Big Five personality traits to psychological distress. A total of 260 undergraduate students (60.4% female) in Singapore completed self-reported questionnaires. A series of path analyses was performed. Firstly, a dual-pathway model of stress coping was established, which consisted of (a) a stress–threat–distress pathway where a stress-is-a-threat mindset mediated the association between stressful experiences and psychological distress and (b) a challenge–flexibility–enhancement pathway where coping flexibility mediated the relation of a stress-is-a-challenge mindset to a lower level of psychological distress, without being influenced by stressful experiences. Furthermore, Neuroticism was associated with the stress–threat–distress pathway, with stressful experiences and a stress-is-a-treat mindset mediating the relation of Neuroticism to psychological distress. Conscientiousness was associated with the challenge–flexibility–enhancement pathway, with a stress-is-a-challenge mindset and coping flexibility mediating the relation of Conscientiousness to less psychological distress. Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Openness were directly associated with greater coping flexibility. The findings enrich the literature on personality and stress coping and inform future interventions to promote mental health. MDPI 2022-04-19 /pmc/articles/PMC9105170/ /pubmed/35566398 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11092272 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Chen, Luxi
Qu, Li
Hong, Ryan Y.
Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title_full Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title_fullStr Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title_full_unstemmed Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title_short Pathways Linking the Big Five to Psychological Distress: Exploring the Mediating Roles of Stress Mindset and Coping Flexibility
title_sort pathways linking the big five to psychological distress: exploring the mediating roles of stress mindset and coping flexibility
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9105170/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35566398
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11092272
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