The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on stress: a cross-national analysis of economic and public health policies and individual characteristics

The COVID-19 pandemic has added substantial health and economic stress to peoples' lives. According to stress process theory, social stressors are unequally distributed across sociodemographic groups suggesting that some groups have experienced greater stress during the pandemic than others. Moreover, government actions taken during the pandemic, such as public health and economic relief measures intended to protect and aid people might have benefited some groups more than others. Using the COVIDiSTRESS survey and country-level data on public health and economic relief measures, we conducted an exploratory analysis of how individual characteristics and COVID-19 policies have impacted self-reported stress. We find several demographic variables, COVID-19 related concerns, and social resources predict stress levels. In addition, we find that the stress buffering effects of COVID-19 public health and economic relief measures are unequal for men and women wherein men benefited from these measures in terms of stress reduction while women did not.