Personality, Defenses, Mentalization, and Epistemic Trust Related to Pandemic Containment Strategies and the COVID-19 Vaccine: A Sequential Mediation Model

Annalisa Tanzilli (), Alice Cibelli, Marianna Liotti, Flavia Fiorentino, Riccardo Williams and Vittorio Lingiardi
Additional contact information
Annalisa Tanzilli: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Alice Cibelli: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Marianna Liotti: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Flavia Fiorentino: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Riccardo Williams: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Vittorio Lingiardi: Department of Dynamic and Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Faculty of Medicine and Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 21, 1-22

Abstract: Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has considerably influenced all domains of people’s lives worldwide, determining a high increase in overall psychological distress and several clinical conditions. The study attempted to shed light on the relationship between the strategies adopted to manage the pandemic, vaccine hesitancy, and distinct features of personality and mental functioning. Methods: The sample consisted of 367 Italian individuals (68.1% women, 31.9% men; M age = 37, SD = 12.79) who completed an online survey, including an instrument assessing four response styles to the pandemic and lockdown(s), the Personality Inventory for DSM-5-Brief Form, the Defense Mechanisms Rating Scales-Self-Report-30, the Reflective Functioning Questionnaire, and the Epistemic Trust, Mistrust, Credulity Questionnaire. Results: Maladaptive response patterns to pandemic restrictions were related to dysfunctional personality traits, immature defense mechanisms, poor mentalization, and epistemic mistrust or credulity. Moreover, more severe levels of personality pathology were predictive of an extraverted-maladaptive response style to health emergency through the full mediation of low overall defensive functioning, poor certainty of others’ mental states, and high epistemic credulity. Conclusions: Recognizing and understanding dysfunctional psychological pathways associated with individuals’ difficulties in dealing with the pandemic are crucial for developing tailored mental-health interventions and promoting best practices in healthcare services.

Keywords: COVID-19 pandemic; vaccine hesitancy; personality; defense mechanisms; mentalization; reflective functioning; epistemic trust (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/21/14290/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/21/14290/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:21:p:14290-:d:960538

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().