Resilience mediates the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health in a sample of adults in Panama

Diana C Oviedo; Adam E Tratner; María Sofía Pinzón; Sofía Rodríguez-Araña; Elianne Pauli-Quirós; Carlos Chavarría; Camilo Posada Rodríguez; Gabrielle B Britton

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1235935

Resilience mediates the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health in a sample of adults in Panama

Front Psychol. 2023 Nov 16:14:1235935. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1235935. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Diana C Oviedo^#^{1

2

3}, Adam E Tratner^#^{1

3

4}, María Sofía Pinzón², Sofía Rodríguez-Araña¹, Elianne Pauli-Quirós^{1

2}, Carlos Chavarría^{1

2}, Camilo Posada Rodríguez¹, Gabrielle B Britton^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ Centro de Neurociencias y Unidad de Investigación Clínica, Instituto de Investigaciones Científicas y Servicios de Alta Tecnología (INDICASAT-AIP), Panama, Panama.
² Escuela de Psicología, Universidad Santa María la Antigua (USMA), Panama, Panama.
³ Sistema Nacional de Investigación (SNI) SENACYT, Panama, Panama.
⁴ Florida State University, Panama, Panama.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic was characterized by global increases in depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms. Previous studies have shown that resilience mitigates these symptoms, however there is limited research exploring the link between resilience and mental illness during the COVID-19 pandemic in Central America.

Objective: To examine the role of resilience as it relates to the perceived effect of the pandemic on mental health symptoms.

Methods: A sample of 480 adults in Panama were recruited from March to May 2021 to complete an online survey. The online survey consisted of sociodemographic questions and scale measures assessing depression, anxiety and stress symptoms, resilience, and social support.

Results: Results indicated that resilience mediated the relationship between the perceived effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and mental health symptoms; participants who felt more personally affected by the pandemic reported more depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms via decreased resilience. Further analyses revealed that resilience was moderated by sex and social support, showing that the indirect effect of resilience was greater for women and individuals who perceived low social support.

Discussion: These findings contribute to a growing body of research documenting the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health and reveal potential mechanisms through which pandemic-related distress decreases resilience, thereby increasing symptoms of mental illness.

Keywords: COVID-19; Latin America; anxiety; depression; mediation; mental health; resilience; stress.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by the Sistema Nacional de Investigación (SNI) for GBB (063-2023), AET (040-2023), DCO (044-2023), and the Secretaría Nacional de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación (SENACYT) (FID22-092, GBB and DCO).