Citation

Liu L, Li Y, Yu Q, Wu X, Wang W. Eur. J. Psychotraumatol. 2024; 15(1): e2360281.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2024, The Author(s), Publisher Co-action Publishing)

DOI

10.1080/20008066.2024.2360281

PMID

38856044

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The initial wave of the COVID-19 pandemic significantly deteriorated mental health, especially among college students. Self-compassion has demonstrated benefits for psychological outcomes such as depressive symptoms, life satisfaction, posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS), and posttraumatic growth (PTG). Notably, existing literature suggests that the protective and vulnerable aspects within the Self-Compassion Scale, namely, compassionate and uncompassionate self-responding (CSR and USR), can coexist within individuals and influence their mental health through various coexisting patterns. However, this process has not been sufficiently explored.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to explore the combined effects of CSR and USR on college students' depressive symptoms, life satisfaction, PTSS, and PTG during the initial wave of the pandemic.

METHOD: In this cross-sectional study, 4450 Chinese college students (51.9% females, M(age) = 20.58 years, SD = 1.49) completed self-report measures amid the COVID-19 pandemic's initial wave in 2020. Response surface analyses were utilised to investigate the combined effects of CSR and USR.

RESULTS: Simultaneously increased CSR and USR were associated with a slight increase in depressive symptoms, PTSS, and life satisfaction, but a substantial increase in PTG. Conversely, increased CSR and decreased USR were associated with a considerable decrease in depressive symptoms and PTSS, a significant increase in life satisfaction, and a moderate increase in PTG.

CONCLUSIONS: CSR and USR demonstrated protective and vulnerable impacts, respectively. It is imperative to analyse their combined effects as an interactive system and consider the specific characteristics of different psychological responses.

Language: en

Keywords

Humans; Cross-Sectional Studies; Adult; Female; Male; Universities; COVID-19; Young Adult; China; Personal Satisfaction; depressive symptoms; life satisfaction; posttraumatic growth; Self-compassion; SARS-CoV-2; Pandemics; Posttraumatic Growth, Psychological; *COVID-19/psychology; *Depression/psychology; *Empathy; *Mental Health; *Students/psychology/statistics & numerical data; análisis de superficie de respuesta; Autocompasión; crecimiento postraumático; posttraumatic stress symptoms; response surface analysis; satisfacción con la vida; síntomas de estrés postraumático; síntomas depresivos; Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic/psychology