Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers
BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with increased rates of mental health problems, particularly in younger people.ObjectiveWe quantified mental health of online workers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, and cognition during the early stages of the pandemic in 2020. A pre-regi...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2023-03-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychiatry |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.995445/full |
| _version_ | 1797857885247504384 |
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| author | Colleen Mills-Finnerty Colleen Mills-Finnerty Halee Staggs Halee Staggs Nichole Hogoboom Sharon Naparstek Tiffany Harvey Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Ruth O’Hara Ruth O’Hara |
| author_facet | Colleen Mills-Finnerty Colleen Mills-Finnerty Halee Staggs Halee Staggs Nichole Hogoboom Sharon Naparstek Tiffany Harvey Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Ruth O’Hara Ruth O’Hara |
| author_sort | Colleen Mills-Finnerty |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with increased rates of mental health problems, particularly in younger people.ObjectiveWe quantified mental health of online workers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, and cognition during the early stages of the pandemic in 2020. A pre-registered data analysis plan was completed, testing the following three hypotheses: reward-related behaviors will remain intact as age increases; cognitive performance will decline with age; mood symptoms will worsen during the pandemic compared to before. We also conducted exploratory analyses including Bayesian computational modeling of latent cognitive parameters.MethodsSelf-report depression (Patient Health Questionnaire 8) and anxiety (General Anxiety Disorder 7) prevalence were compared from two samples of Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers ages 18–76: pre-COVID 2018 (N = 799) and peri-COVID 2020 (N = 233). The peri-COVID sample also completed a browser-based neurocognitive test battery.ResultsWe found support for two out of three pre-registered hypotheses. Notably our hypothesis that mental health symptoms would increase in the peri-COVID sample compared to pre-COVID sample was not supported: both groups reported high mental health burden, especially younger online workers. Higher mental health symptoms were associated with negative impacts on cognitive performance (speed/accuracy tradeoffs) in the peri-COVID sample. We found support for two hypotheses: reaction time slows down with age in two of three attention tasks tested, whereas reward function and accuracy appear to be preserved with age.ConclusionThis study identified high mental health burden, particularly in younger online workers, and associated negative impacts on cognitive function. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-09T21:04:03Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-694e110b25d0441b8660465671c001be |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-0640 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-09T21:04:03Z |
| publishDate | 2023-03-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychiatry |
| spelling | doaj.art-694e110b25d0441b8660465671c001be2023-03-29T04:21:41ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychiatry1664-06402023-03-011410.3389/fpsyt.2023.995445995445Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workersColleen Mills-Finnerty0Colleen Mills-Finnerty1Halee Staggs2Halee Staggs3Nichole Hogoboom4Sharon Naparstek5Tiffany Harvey6Sherry A. Beaudreau7Sherry A. Beaudreau8Sherry A. Beaudreau9Ruth O’Hara10Ruth O’Hara11Sierra Pacific Mental Illness, Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Veterans Administration Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesDepartment of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesSierra Pacific Mental Illness, Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Veterans Administration Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesShiley-Marcos School of Engineering, University of San Diego, San Diego, CA, United StatesDepartment of Psychology, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA, United StatesDepartment of Psychology, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, IsraelDepartment of Biochemistry, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Chattanooga, TN, United StatesSierra Pacific Mental Illness, Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Veterans Administration Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesDepartment of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesSchool of Psychology, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, AustraliaSierra Pacific Mental Illness, Research, Education, and Clinical Center, Veterans Administration Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesDepartment of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, United StatesBackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with increased rates of mental health problems, particularly in younger people.ObjectiveWe quantified mental health of online workers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, and cognition during the early stages of the pandemic in 2020. A pre-registered data analysis plan was completed, testing the following three hypotheses: reward-related behaviors will remain intact as age increases; cognitive performance will decline with age; mood symptoms will worsen during the pandemic compared to before. We also conducted exploratory analyses including Bayesian computational modeling of latent cognitive parameters.MethodsSelf-report depression (Patient Health Questionnaire 8) and anxiety (General Anxiety Disorder 7) prevalence were compared from two samples of Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers ages 18–76: pre-COVID 2018 (N = 799) and peri-COVID 2020 (N = 233). The peri-COVID sample also completed a browser-based neurocognitive test battery.ResultsWe found support for two out of three pre-registered hypotheses. Notably our hypothesis that mental health symptoms would increase in the peri-COVID sample compared to pre-COVID sample was not supported: both groups reported high mental health burden, especially younger online workers. Higher mental health symptoms were associated with negative impacts on cognitive performance (speed/accuracy tradeoffs) in the peri-COVID sample. We found support for two hypotheses: reaction time slows down with age in two of three attention tasks tested, whereas reward function and accuracy appear to be preserved with age.ConclusionThis study identified high mental health burden, particularly in younger online workers, and associated negative impacts on cognitive function.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.995445/fullCOVID-19depressionanxietybehavior and cognitioncomputational modelingBayesian analysis |
| spellingShingle | Colleen Mills-Finnerty Colleen Mills-Finnerty Halee Staggs Halee Staggs Nichole Hogoboom Sharon Naparstek Tiffany Harvey Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Sherry A. Beaudreau Ruth O’Hara Ruth O’Hara Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers Frontiers in Psychiatry COVID-19 depression anxiety behavior and cognition computational modeling Bayesian analysis |
| title | Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers |
| title_full | Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers |
| title_fullStr | Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers |
| title_full_unstemmed | Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers |
| title_short | Association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs. older online workers |
| title_sort | association between mental health symptoms and behavioral performance in younger vs older online workers |
| topic | COVID-19 depression anxiety behavior and cognition computational modeling Bayesian analysis |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.995445/full |
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