The Role of Sense of Coherence During the COVID-19 Crisis: Does it Exercise a Moderating or a Mediating Effect on University Students’ Wellbeing?

The COVID-19 crisis caused extensive mental health strains. Sense of coherence (SOC) is considered a protective factor for mental health in crisis that might also be decisive during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the mechanisms are not yet well understood. Using longitudinal survey data of 117 Austrian university students collected in 2020, we tested both moderating and mediating effects of SOC for the association of different stressors with later wellbeing. SOC did not buffer but mediated the effects of stressors on wellbeing. Students especially suffered from reduced feelings of manageability when confronted with financial strains, dissatisfying study situations, or disrupted plans. Supporting them in managing the difficulties of the crisis should therefore be considered a crucial part of psychosocial support.

• Publication year

  2023

• Venue

  SAGE Open

• Publication date

  2023-01-01

• Fields of study

  Medicine, Psychology

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1177/21582440231160123PMID 36942126PMCID 10018232
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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