Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies as Mediators between Resilience and Stress during COVID-19 Pandemic.

(1) Background: Although there is accumulating evidence for the associations between resilience, emotion regulation and stress, little is known about the mechanisms of these relations. To extend the existing research, the present study examined cognitive emotion regulation strategies as one potential mechanism between trait resilience and perceived stress during the COVID-19 pandemic. (2) Methods: Young adults (N = 266; M = 20.05; SD = 3.93) were invited to fill out questionnaires that assessed trait resilience, cognitive emotion regulation strategies and perceived stress. (3) Results: The results showed that resilience was negatively associated with perceived stress and with self-blame, catastrophizing and rumination, and positively associated with positive reappraisal, focus on planning, positive refocus and putting into perspective. Stress was positively associated with self-blame, catastrophizing, rumination, other-blame and acceptance, and negatively associated with positive reappraisal and positive refocus. Moreover, positive refocus, rumination, catastrophizing and self-blame partially explained the associations between trait resilience and perceived stress during the COVID-19 pandemic. (4) Conclusions: These findings highlight the potential utility of targeting cognitive emotion regulation strategies in the development and implementation of preventive interventions for reducing stress during highly challenging situations.

Social and Emotional Learning and Internalizing Problems among Adolescents: The Mediating Role of Resilience.

(1) Background: The high rates of mental disorders in adolescence presented in the literature often exclude internalizing problems. Although there is extensive data on the effectiveness of SEL skills in improving resilience, few studies included evidence in their reports on the relationship between SEL skills and internalizing problems. The present study aims to deepen the understanding of the relationship between SEL, resilience, and internalizing problems, by investigating the mediating effect of resilience between SEL components and internalizing problems. (2) Methods: Adolescents (N = 968 adolescents, aged between 11 and 18 years old; M = 13.30; SD = 1.92) from 30 schools from the NE region of Romania were invited to fill out questionnaires on social and emotional learning, internalizing problems, and resilience. (3) Results: The results show that resilience mediates the link between self-awareness and internalizing problems, between self-management and internalizing problems, between relationship skills and internalizing problems, and between responsible decision-making and internalizing problems. (4) Conclusions: These findings revealed the need for social and emotional learning interventions that include resilience-oriented approaches in order to decrease internalizing problems in adolescents. Moreover, we suggest that more culturally appropriate interventions are required to better investigate the interaction between SEL components, resilience, and internalizing problems.

An exploratory study of Romanians' attitudes toward community-based substance abuse recovery housing.

This study reports results of a measure of a Romanian community's attitudes toward addiction and the hypothetical creation of self-run substance abuse recovery homes called Oxford Houses in Iași, Romania. We list five factors needed to sustain an Oxford House: affordable housing, residents following OH principles, resident income, institutional support, and community support. Because individual Oxford Houses are located in ordinary residential neighborhoods, they rely in part on community support. Descriptive data analyses provided information on four groups based on participants' status: (1) no contact with someone with alcohol misuse; (2) having a potentially alcohol addicted person(s) in their family; (3) definitely having alcohol addicted person(s) in their family; and (4) having an addicted alcohol in recovery person(s) in their family. Results indicated Romanian's favorable attitude toward alcohol addiction as a treatable condition, benefits of being part of an Oxford House, Oxford House rules and principles, and willingness to organize or to participate in events for integrating Oxford House residents into the community. These findings suggest that Oxford House could potentially be accepted by neighborhood residents in Iași, Romania, and this research could inform future efforts to create Oxford Houses in Romania.