The relations between emotion regulation, depression and anxiety among medical staff during the late stage of COVID-19 pandemic: a network analysis

Abstract

Existing research proposed that moving from a disorder-level analysis to a symptom-level analysis may provide a more fine-grained understanding of psychopathology. This study aimed to explore the relations between two dimensions (i.e., cognitive reappraisal, CR; expressive suppression, ES) of emotion regulation (ER) and various symptoms of depression and anxiety among medical staff during the late stage of COVID-19 pandemic. We examined depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms and ER among 420 medical staff during the late stage of COVID-19 pandemic. Two networks (i.e. ER-depression network and ER-anxiety network) were constructed in the present study. Bridge centrality index was calculated for each variable within the two networks. Among the present sample, the prevalences of depression and anxiety are 39.5% and 26.0%. Within ER-depression/anxiety networks, CR is only negatively linked with depression/anxiety symptoms while ES is both positively and negatively linked with depression/anxiety symptoms. Results of bridge centrality revealed that in both of two networks, CR has a negative bridge expected influence value while ES has a positive bridge expected influence value. The results revealed the specific role of CR and ES in relation to depression and anxiety at a symptom level. Implications for clinical preventions and interventions are discussed.