CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 55Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive ProcessesChild and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional DevelopmentMental Health Research Topics

Positive affect as a buffer between chronic stress and symptom severity of emotional disorders

Open access
Sewart, Amy R., Zbozinek, Tomislav D., Hammen, Constance, Zinbarg, Richard E., Mineka, Susan, Craske, Michelle G.·2019·Clinical Psychological Science
DOI 10.1177/2167702619834576PMC PMC6800737
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Research has demonstrated that stressors play a critical role in the development of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), social anxiety disorder (SAD), and major depressive disorder (MDD). Separately, deficits in positive affect (PA) have been identified in GAD, SAD, and MDD. Whereas previous research has linked the buffering effects of PA in chronic illness, such effects have yet to be investigated for chronic stressors and emotional disorder–related symptom severity. The purpose of the present study was to examine PA as a moderator of chronic interpersonal and noninterpersonal stress on GAD, SAD, and MDD symptom severity. Using a multilevel statistical approach with a sample of adolescents and young adults ( N = 463), PA was found to moderate significantly the relationship between chronic interpersonal stress and symptom severity for MDD and SAD. Findings suggest that in times of chronic interpersonal stress, higher PA may serve as a buffer from development of SAD and MDD symptoms.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1177/2167702619834576

Cites

102 of 102 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • The PANAS and MASQ are commonly employed in socially anxious groups and across disorders to measure affective abnormalities.

    “The PANAS and MASQ have been used frequently in socially anxious samples (see Kashdan, 2007 for review) and across disorders to assess affective abnormalities (e.g., Brown, Chorpita, & Barlow, 1998; Sewart et al., 2019; Watson & Naragon-Gainey, 2010).”

    From Examining Positive and Negative Affect as Outcomes and Moderators of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Social Anxiety Disorder. (2019) · cites this paper as Sewart et al., 2019

    In Methods > Measures (page not provided), the paper uses MASQ subscales to measure positive and negative affect while examining SAD, GAD, and MDD. In the Discussion, it mentions PANAS-X only as a possible measure for future studies; it does not report using PANAS or establish that both instruments are frequently used in socially anxious samples. (LLM, conf=0.86)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • High levels of trait positive affect functioned as a protective factor in predicting lower rates of anxiety disorders prospectively and in buffering the effects of stressful life events upon the risk for social anxiety disorder.

    “High levels of trait positive affect functioned as a protective factor in predicting lower rates of anxiety disorders prospectively, and as a protective factor in buffering the effects of stressful life events upon the risk for social anxiety disorder 213 .”

    From The clinical characterization of the adult patient with an anxiety or related disorder aimed at personalization of management (2021) · cites this paper as [213]

    The Results (Symptom Severity, Chronic Interpersonal Stress, and Positive Affect; page not supplied) report that higher positive affect buffered the effect of chronic interpersonal stress on later social anxiety disorder (SAD) symptom severity. The claim goes beyond those findings: the study assessed symptom severity, not rates or risk of anxiety disorder diagnoses, and the Discussion notes that its past-week positive-affect measure was not specifically designed to capture trait affect. (LLM, conf=0.88)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • Positive emotionality is a core element of mental health and shows beneficial, generalized effects on health and functioning.

    “positive emotionality is considered a core element of mental health, showing beneficial, generalized effects on health and functioning [34-37].”

    From Negative and positive affect regulation in a transdiagnostic internet-based protocol for emotional disorders: Randomized controlled trial (2021) · cites this paper as [36]

    The Introduction (page not available) describes positive affect as beneficial for resilience, problem solving, coping, social resources, physiological responses, and emotional well-being, supporting broad benefits for health and functioning. It does not characterize positive emotionality as a core element of mental health. (LLM, conf=0.84)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 2

  1. Sewart AR, & Craske MG (in press). Inhibitory Learning in Exposure Therapy In Abramowitz JA & Blakey S (Eds.), Clinical Handbook of Fear and Anxiety: Psychological Processes and Treatment Mechanisms.
  2. Spitzer M, Robert L, Gibbon M, & Williams J (2002). Structured clinical interview for DSM-IV-TR axis I disorders, research version, non-patient edition (SCID-I/NP). New York: Biometrics Research, New York State Psychiatric Institute.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Sewart, A. R., Zbozinek, T. D., Hammen, C., Zinbarg, R. E., Mineka, S., & Craske, M. G.
Affiliations
  • University of California, Los Angeles (US)
  • California Institute of Technology (US)
  • Northwestern University (US)
Corresponding author
Sewart, Amy R.
ORCID
Venue
Clinical Psychological Science
Publisher
SAGE Publications
Published
2019-04-10
Volume
7
Issue
5
Pages
914-927
ISSN
  • 2167-7026 (ISSN-L)
  • 2167-7034
DOI
10.1177/2167702619834576
PMC
PMC6800737
OpenAlex
W2936557741
Cited by
55
References
92
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 10 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 8 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 11 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 2
FWCI
6.99
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
journals.sagepub.com/page/policies/text-and-data-mining-license (tdm)
Locations
  • Clinical Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • CaltechAUTHORS (California Institute of Technology) (submittedVersion)
Funders
National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH65651, R01 MH65652)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Mental Health Research Topics
Keywords
positive affect, chronic stress, buffering effect, generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, major depressive disorder, symptom severity, interpersonal stress, adolescents and young adults

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review