ABSTRACT
Background: The COVID-19 pandemic is an ongoing stressor that has resulted in millions of deaths and worsening of psychiatric health worldwide. However, we lack knowledge regarding the influence of specific behavioral and neural factors that may alleviate the impact of the pandemic on mental health. Thus, we assessed whether pre-pandemic resilient coping strategy engagement and frontolimbic circuitry influence depression and anxiety symptoms during the pandemic. Methods: In 72 young adults (72.2% female, mean age 24 years), we assessed depression and anxiety symptoms (BDI and SCARED-A), resilient coping strategies (CD-RISC), and resting-state functional connectivity (FC) of frontolimbic circuitry using fMRI. We conducted general linear models to test preregistered hypotheses that 1) less resilient coping pre-pandemic and 2) weaker frontolimbic FC pre-pandemic would predict more severe symptoms during the pandemic;and 3) coping would interact with FC to predict symptoms during the pandemic. Results: Anxiety symptoms worsened during the pandemic as compared to pre-pandemic, while depression symptoms improved (ps<0.001). Less resilient coping predicted more severe depression symptoms during the pandemic (p=0.023). Weaker frontolimbic FC pre-pandemic predicted more severe obsessive-compulsive (p=0.015) and separation anxiety symptoms (p=0.040) during the pandemic. Resilient coping interacted with frontolimbic FC to predict depression (p<0.001), obsessive-compulsive (p=0.041), panic (p=0.017), and generalized anxiety (p=0.027) symptoms during the pandemic. Conclusions: Less coping strategy engagement and weaker frontolimbic FC may represent risk factors for poor psychiatric health during the pandemic. This research may inform efforts to ameliorate the adverse psychological effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as subsequent global stressful events. Supported By: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director’s Early Independence Award (DP5OD021370) to DGG;Brain and Behavior Research Foundation (National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression;NARSAD) Young Investigator Award to DGG;and National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program Award to BHG and JCF. Keywords: Depression, Anxiety, Brain Imaging, fMRI, Coping Strategies, COVID-19 Pandemic