Gender Differences in the Impact of COVID-19 Lockdown on Potentially Addictive Behaviors: An Emotion-Mediated Analysis

Relationship between time perspective and depressive symptoms in young people working in high-altitude environments

BACKGROUND

Depression rates are significantly higher in high-altitude regions, making it important to understand its underlying mechanisms. Time perspective, which refers to how individuals perceive their past, present, and future, is closely linked to depression in low-altitude areas. However, its relationship with depression in high-altitude regions remains unclear.

METHODS

A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 4942 young male workers from high-altitude regions. The association between time perspectives and depressive symptoms were examined by univariate and multivariate analyses. Network analysis was employed to identify central symptoms and their interactions, and to compare the differences between individuals with and without depression.

RESULTS

The study identified that elevated past negative (PN), reduced past positive (PP), increased present fatalistic (PF) and present hedonistic (PH) orientations, and lower future (F) were significant risk factors for depressive symptoms in plateau populations. In the network structure of the depression group, PN, PF, PH, SDS18 "emptiness", and SDS13 "psychomotor agitation" were key elements influencing depressive symptoms and the strongest edge was F-PP. Significant differences were detected between the depressive and non-depressive groups, with the depressive group demonstrating significantly greater global strength invariance and a more robust network invariance.

CONCLUSIONS

Abnormal time perspectives, especially PN, PF and PH were strongly associated with depression in high-altitude environments, and the strong connection between F-PP provides a potential intervention target. Future research should further explore the causal relationship.

Women's Mental Health and Lessons Learnt from the COVID-19 Pandemic

Women are at the highest risk of pandemic adversities as they represent the majority of health and frontline workers in addition to their essential roles at home. We review gender differences during the COVID-19 pandemic by demonstrating risk-exposure during specific situations such as pregnancy, women's mental health fallouts, COVID-19 disease itself and exposure to different forms of violence. We discuss the particularities that women face in developing countries with depicted examples from some countries in Africa and the Middle East. Women mental health care service stands out as an essential component of the national response to pandemics. Women's integration and leadership in the national pandemic response planning is crucial.

Target-the-Two: a lab-in-the-field experiment on routinization

The paper investigates the cognitive determinants of routinization and creativity by means of a lab-in-the-field experiment run at the 20th edition of a mass gathering festival in Italy ("La Notte della Taranta"). Subjects play repeatedly the puzzle version of the Target-The-Two game (32 hands). In hands 1-16, the strategy that is optimal given the card distribution is always the same and it is the easiest to be discovered. Conversely, in hands 17-32, subjects are exposed to games where the optimal contextual strategy may differ from the one with which they have been made familiar. We investigate whether and how, in hands 17-32, subjects remain routinized on the familiar strategy, or creatively choose a different one. We define as "experts" those subjects who played the optimal contextual strategy in the overwhelming majority of hands 1-16. In hands 17-32, we find several subjects playing the familiar strategy even when it is not the optimal one, regardless of whether they are experts or not. This shows that routinization is deep-rooted in the cognitive individual process. Furthermore, routinization pays off only for inexpert subjects: creative inexpert subjects are slower and they fail to find the optimal contextual strategy in several hands. Among expert subjects instead, creative subjects, although still slower, need less moves than routinized ones to find the optimal contextual strategy.

Postlockdown Performance in French Swimming Championships

PURPOSE

To measure the proportion of French swimmers that progressed, stagnated, or regressed during the 2020 national championship compared with previous ones.

METHOD

Individual best performances were collected at the French national championships from 2000 to 2020. Yearly proportions of swimmers who improved, stagnated, or regressed in performances were compared with their previous performances.

RESULTS

In 2020, the proportion of swimmers with performance regression has significantly increased (33% vs 17% in 2019). Women showed a higher proportion of performance regression (41%) than men (26%, P < .0001) in 2020. Only 39% of women and 53% of men experienced progression in 2020 (vs 60.8% [3.7%] and 66.7% [5.2%], respectively, in the previous years). Only the 2008 and 2009 championships showed a regression proportion that did not increase with age. The 2010 championship (the year of swimsuits ban) showed a higher proportion of regressing athletes than these previous years. Long-distance events showed higher proportion of performance regression (36.2% [0.5%]) for 400-, 800-, and 1500-m races than for short-distance ones (32.1% [3.2%]; 50-, 100-, and 200-m events). Breaststroke events showed higher regression (42.4%) than other styles (30.5% [2.1%]). Younger swimmers more often improved their performance than older ones (61.9% [8.5%] for swimmers less than 18 y of age vs 20.0% [10.8%] for those 25 y and older).

CONCLUSION

A high proportion of swimmers experienced performance regression during the 2020 French national championships. A higher impact was observed among female, long-distance, and breaststroke swimmers. Eight weeks of lockdown without training may have led to poorer swimming performances.

The Acute Impact of the Early Stages of COVID-19 Pandemic in People with Pre-Existing Psychiatric Disorders: A Systematic Review

People with pre-pandemic health conditions are more vulnerable and more likely to suffer greater psychosocial impact due to the current COVID-19 pandemic and the lockdown measures. Thus, the objective of this work was to systematically review the impact of the early stages COVID-19 pandemic on people with pre-existing psychiatric disorders. The search was performed between 23 January and 2 September 2021 in PubMed, PsycINFO, and EMBASE. A total of 4167 published results were identified; however, only 49 were included in this review. Results show that there was considerable heterogeneity among studies, which resulted in a low consensus. However, it seems that the impact of the first stage of the COVID-19 pandemic on psychiatric disorders was two-fold: (1) an overall effect, in which people suffering from psychiatric disorders in general experienced more psychological distress and anxiety when compared to people who had no psychiatric diagnosis, and (2) a condition-specific effect, namely in people suffering from eating disorders and obsessive compulsive disorders. Moreover, the current work highlights that there were also some external factors that were related to worsening symptoms. For instance, unemployment or experiencing work and financial difficulties can be a trigger for greater distress during the pandemic for people with mood disorders, and being alone and in social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic may actually increase substance use and relapse rates. Further studies are needed to prospectively investigate the long-term effects of the current COVID-19 pandemic on people with (pre)-existing psychiatric conditions and on the onset or deterioration of psychiatric-related symptoms in a larger number of participants, as well as exploring the long-term effects of the current pandemic on mental health.

Did Mindful People Do Better during the COVID-19 Pandemic? Mindfulness Is Associated with Well-Being and Compliance with Prophylactic Measures

This paper investigates the relationship between mindfulness and well-being within the context of compliance with prophylactic measures in the time of COVID-19. We conducted a large-scale survey among a representative sample of the French population. We measured mindfulness, using the Mindful Attention Awareness Scale, and the extent to which respondents were impacted by COVID-19 in terms of their mood and quality of sleep, as well as how they complied with prophylactic measures. Our results suggest that more mindful individuals were less negatively impacted by COVID-19 with regard to their sleep and mood. Concerning the prophylactic measures, we obtained mixed results: more mindful participants were more likely to respect lockdowns, physical distancing and to cough in their sleeves, but did not wash their hands, wear masks or avoid touching their face more often than less mindful individuals.

Psychoactive substance use, internet use and mental health changes during the COVID-19 lockdown in a French population: A study of gender effect

INTRODUCTION

COVID-19 has enormous impacts on each individual. The goals of our study were (1) to assess the rate of internet and psychoactive substance use, clinical depression and anxiety in a French population during the lockdown (2) to study the role of clinical and socio-demographic variables (especially, gender).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

During lockdown, an online anonymous questionnaire was used to assess socio-demographic and health data, previous psychiatric history, anterior and current internet and psychoactive substance use, current anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation. The associations of socio-demographic, clinical variables with anxiety, depression, internet or psychoactive substance use were examined.

RESULTS

The study included 263 participants (aged 38.1 ± 15.3-197 males and 64 females). During the lockdown, internet use increased in 14.4% of cases, alcohol use in 20.2%, and tobacco use in 6.8%. In contrast, more participants reported a decrease in alcohol, tobacco or illicit drug use (25.9, 24, and 27.8% respectively). Anxiety was reported in 62.4% and depression in 20.2% of cases; 29.7% of participants reported an increase in anxiety and 25.5% an increase in depression. Depression was associated with an increase in internet and tobacco use. Tobacco and alcohol use were positively associated and an increase in use was more frequent in previous users of both substances. Maintaining a daily routine and relationships with family, being self-employed were associated to lower risks of depression and anxiety.

CONCLUSION

Higher rates of internet use, as well as depression and anxiety, were observed during the lockdown. Gender was not a significant associated factor.