Coping with COVID-19: the efficacy of disengagement for coping with the chronic stress of a pandemic

ABSTRACT

Background

The COVID-19 pandemic was a novel chronic stressor that necessitated figuring out how to cope with it. We hypothesized that disengagement coping – coping with a stressor by disengaging from it – would be effective because the pandemic featured heightened uncertainty and enduring intensity.

Design

We assessed the disengagement strategies of distraction – taking a break from a stressor – and avoidance – avoiding thoughts and feelings associated with a stressor – and emotional well-being outcomes (positive/negative emotions, stress) in three waves one week apart (305 participants completed all three waves).

Results

Distraction was one of the most frequently endorsed coping strategies. The results of multi-level models and cross-lagged panel models showed that participants who used distraction habitually experienced better emotional well-being overall and that using distraction led to better emotional well-being that week, but did not predict increases in well-being from one week to the next. Those who used avoidance also experienced better emotional well-being that week, but habitual use of avoidance was associated with worse emotional well-being overall.

Conclusions

These findings suggest that in the midst of chronic stressors like this pandemic, the disengagement coping strategy of distraction is popular and effective for temporarily improving people’s well-being.

KEYWORDS:

• Coping
• emotion regulation
• well-being
• stress
• pandemic

Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge Lauren Healy, Rachel Cooper, Sadie O’Keefe, Caroline Finney, Shayari Peiris, Merritt McDonald, and Jennifer Hernandez-Gonzales for their help in collecting data for this project.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This project was funded by a Wake Forest University Collaborative Pilot Grant to CEW.