Moderating Effect of Coping Strategies on Perceived COVID-19 Stress and Mental Well-Being in Post-COVID Era

Description

Tanusree Bhattacharya and Moumita Basak (Department of Psychology, Barrackpore Rastraguru Surendranath College, Kolkata, West Bengal)

The global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is immense. Wave after wave of the pandemic struck numerous nations, causing social unrest, impeding global development, and harming mental health. The impact of COVID-19 on mental well-being in the post-pandemic phase is still at a nascent stage of research. Therefore, the present study aims to examine the impact of perceived COVID-19 stress on mental well-being in the post-COVID era among middle- aged men and women. The present study also tried to find the moderating effect of coping strategy on the relationship between perceived stress and mental well-being. The data were collected from 172 middle-aged men and 154 middle aged women of Kolkata and North 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India. Purposive sampling method was followed for data collection. Perceived stress questionnaire (PSQ) (Levenstein & colleagues, 1993), Warwick-Edinburgh mental well-being scale (WEMWBS) (Tennant et al., 2007), and Brief-Cope scale (Carver, 1997) were used to collect data. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and correlation analysis were employed to investigate the association between COVID-19 stress and mental well-being. Linear regression analysis was done to test the moderating effect of Coping Strategies. The result shows the presence of COVID-19 stress on mental well-being in post COVID era. However, coping strategy has a moderating effect in reducing the impacts of perceived COVID stress on mental well – being. Limitations and implications of the present study have also been discussed.