{"doi":"10.3389/fpsyg.2021.693396","title":"COVID-19-Related Daily Stress Processes in College-Aged Adults: Examining the Role of Depressive Symptom Severity","abstract":"Exposure to daily stressors specific to the COVID-19 pandemic (e.g., threat of infection) is associated with emotional distress, heightened stress reactivity, and increased depressive symptomology. Herein, we examined whether current depressive symptomology modulates the association between COVID-19-related daily stressor exposure and negative affective reactivity in young, otherwise healthy, college-aged adults. Fifty-eight adults (21 men; 22±3years) completed a daily web-based interview for eight consecutive days to assess COVID-19-related daily stress exposure and emotional responsiveness (September–November 2020). Depressive symptom severity was assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), and a score of ≥10 (range: 0–27) was used to define adults with a depressive episode ( n =20). Participants reported at least one COVID-19-related stressor on 35.8% of interview days. Depressive symptomology did not predict the likelihood of exposure to a COVID-19-related stressor ( p =0.46; OR=1.52; 95% CI: 0.492–4.718). However, negative affect (NA) was greater on days with an exposure to any COVID-19-specific daily stressor in adults with moderate-to-severe depressive symptoms ( b =0.28, SE=0.093, p =0.003) but not in those without ( b =0.009, SE=0.074, p =0.90), such that negative affective reactivity to COVID-19-related stressors was amplified in adults with a current depressive episode ( p =0.019). Depressive symptomology did not moderate positive affective reactivity ( p =0.686). Taken together, these data suggest that exposure to daily stressors related to COVID-19 further worsens NA in adults with a current depressive episode, potentially rendering them more susceptible to adverse mental health outcomes during the pandemic.","journal":"Frontiers in Psychology","year":2021,"id":194189,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":10,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9543,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":727407,"name":"Ashley M. Darling","orcid":"0000-0002-4431-9465","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":763429,"name":"Jennifer R. Turner","orcid":"0000-0003-1105-9094","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":362429,"name":"Erika F.H. Saunders","orcid":"0000-0001-7222-0828","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":445025,"name":"David M. Almeida","orcid":"0000-0002-5233-8148","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":463715,"name":"Jacqueline Mogle","orcid":"0000-0002-6082-228X","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":484407,"name":"Jody L. Greaney","orcid":"0000-0002-9855-3978","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":59,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:49:55.282992Z","pmid":"34589021","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}