COVID-19

"One's intuition is that, as a society, a response to a pandemic should not be politicized and that we all should act in accordance with the greater public good. This has certainly not been the case."

The social isolation and reduction in physical activity caused by COVID-19 lockdowns appear to have negatively impacted brain metabolism, according to new neuroimaging research from France. The study has been published in the scientific journal Human Brain Mapping. "I'm a...

New research provides evidence that individuals who scored higher in non-clinical psychopathy were more willing to take risks with other people's lives during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study, which was conducted during the initial outbreak of COVID-19 in the United...

A study published in PLOS One highlights the importance of differentiating between social media platforms when considering the psychological impact of social media. The findings revealed that active use of Facebook during the pandemic was tied to greater negative affect,...

"Memes are little units of pop culture that can help us relate to other people, feel less isolated, and have a good laugh in the midst of a really stressful time."

Respondents with higher levels of conservatism tended to report feeling more comfortable around the targets who were not wearing a mask, and this was especially true if the target was Asian. The findings suggest that mask-wearing during the pandemic may...

According to a study published in the Journal of Sleep Research, the COVID-19 pandemic may have changed the way we dream by influencing the content of our nightmares. The researchers found that pandemic-related stress was associated with a higher likelihood...

A study published in the journal of Personality and Individual Differences found that Machiavellianism, primary psychopathy, and collective narcissism positively predicted belief in COVID-19 conspiracies. Further, COVID-19 conspiracy beliefs explained the negative relationship between these dark personality traits and the...

"Conspiracy theories are in many ways harmful for society. But, this study suggests that in the long run, conspiracy theories also are associated with harmful health and well-being outcomes for believers themselves."

New research suggests that conservative media in the United States is particularly appealing to people who are prone to conspiratorial thinking. The use of conservative media, in turn, is associated with increasing belief in COVID-19 conspiracies and reduced willingness to...

An in-depth analysis of more than 120m Twitter posts across the globe has shown that users’ perception of the Covid-19 pandemic became less negative as it has progressed. In a paper published to Frontiers, its authors found a significant decrease...

A series of two longitudinal studies published in Digital Journalism revealed that while online and offline news consumption increased during the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic, so did news avoidance – including news about the pandemic. The researchers...

New research published in the journal Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being sheds light on how personality, social media exposure, and anxiety interact to influence people’s eating behavior during the pandemic. The findings point to a pathway whereby high neuroticism paves...

The team found marked differences in gray matter – which is made up of the cell bodies of neurons that process information in the brain – between those who had been infected with COVID-19 and those who had not. Specifically,...

A team of researchers from the University of South Carolina Upstate have uncovered political and psychological factors associated with important health behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings, published in PLOS One, suggest that trust in science plays a key...