Exploring the Protective Function of Positivity and Regulatory Emotional Self-Efficacy in Time of Pandemic COVID-19

Eriona Thartori, Concetta Pastorelli, Flavia Cirimele, Chiara Remondi, Maria Gerbino, Emanuele Basili, Ainzara Favini, Carolina Lunetti, Irene Fiasconaro and Gian Vittorio Caprara
Additional contact information
Eriona Thartori: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Concetta Pastorelli: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Flavia Cirimele: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Chiara Remondi: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Maria Gerbino: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Emanuele Basili: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Ainzara Favini: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Carolina Lunetti: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Irene Fiasconaro: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy
Gian Vittorio Caprara: Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, 00185 Rome, Italy

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 24, 1-19

Abstract: Despite several empirical studies on the 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic that have highlighted its detrimental effect on individuals’ mental health, the identification of psychological factors that may moderate its impact on individuals’ behavior and well-being remains partly unexplored. The present study was conceived to examine the mediation role of regulatory emotional self-efficacy in the relationship between positivity and anxiety, depression, and perceived self-efficacy in complying with the containment measures to contrast the COVID-19 spread. Furthermore, the moderation role of age was tested. A sample of 1258 participants (64.2% women; M age = 42.09, SD = 13.62) enrolled from the Italian general population answered an online survey aimed at investigating the role of individual differences in facing the COVID-19 pandemic. We opted for a snowball recruiting procedure to find participants. The online survey was disseminated through email invitation and using social media platforms (i.e., Facebook, Instagram). A multi-group path analysis model was performed using Mplus 8.4 to explore the hypothesized relations among variables. The following criteria were employed to evaluate the goodness of fit: χ 2 likelihood ratio statistic, CFI and TLI > 0.95, RMSEA < 0.06 and SRMR < 0.08. The findings corroborated the protective role of both positivity and regulatory emotional self-efficacy in reducing individuals’ anxiety and depressive symptoms, as well as in fostering individuals’ capabilities in complying with the containment measures imposed by the government to reduce the risk of illness and to contain the spread of the virus COVID-19. Specifically, regulatory emotional self-efficacy beliefs partially mediated the relations between positivity and anxiety and depressive symptoms and fully mediated the effect of positivity on perceived self-efficacy beliefs in complying with the containment measures. These paths were equal across ages. The results of the present study appear relevant to implementing psychological interventions aimed to reduce the deleterious effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health through the promotion of individuals’ optimistic orientation and emotion regulation.

Keywords: positivity; self-efficacy beliefs; anxiety; depression; COVID-19 pandemic (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/24/13171/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/24/13171/ (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:18:y:2021:i:24:p:13171-:d:702031

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 ().