Impact of COVID-19 on mental health of children: Stress response profiles and school based intervention

The first study used the latent profile analysis to examine the parent-child stress response profile with salivary cortisol levels and children’ posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) in 119 primary school students in Hubei province during and after the outbreak of COVID-19 in China. The LPA analysis found five family stress response profiles: affected after the pandemic (1), unaffected (2), the resilient group (3), high cortisol (4), and affected during the pandemic group (5). This study indicated that parents’ mental health could influence children’s  cortisol levels and  PTSS during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. For the second study, we invested whether a combination of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) course and Guided Narrative Writing (GNT) was efficacious in reducing anxiety symptoms in primary school students. The CBT course and GNT was offered in a rural area primary school in Hubei Province where COVID-19 started the spread. All four classes of 5th grade students received 3 days of CBT course, and then were randomized to two groups which received either 3 days or GNT-writing or GNT-drawing. The results indicated that the 3-day CBT course was effective in reducing anxiety symptoms for primary school students. Compared to the drawing group, GNT-writing showed better outcome on reducing anxiety symptoms at 6-month follow-up.