57 - We’re all worried about COVID-19, but how much worry is unhelpful?

Dr Lee and Lucky

We have a lively chat with Dr Sherman Lee, an Associate Professor researching COVID-19/Corona virus anxiety at Christopher Newport University in the United States. Sherman tells us about two scales he’s developed measuring 1) Corona anxiety and 2) obsessive thoughts about COVID-19 and grilling us on our responses. We chat through how these scales are helpful in identifying who has significant or extreme COVID-19 related anxiety and what problematic thoughts someone might be having. Along the way we draw on how Sherman got into this research, the role of spirituality in mental health and what COVID-19 anxiety can look like day to day. To wrap up we talk about some of the oddities of lock down in things we came across.

Dr Sherman Lee’s links:

Sherman can be contacted at: sherman.lee@cnu if you have any questions about the topic or using the measures for screening.

Papers:

Lee, S. A. (in press). Coronavirus Anxiety Scale: A brief mental health screener for COVID-19 related anxiety. Death Studies. doi: 10.1080/07481187.2020.1748481

Lee, S. A., Jobe, M. C., & Mathis, A. A. (2020). Mental health characteristics associated with dysfunctional coronavirus anxiety. Psychological Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1017/S003329172000121X

Lee, S. A. (2020). How much “Thinking” about COVID-19 is clinically dysfunctional? Brain, Behavior, and Immunity. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbi.2020.04.067

For more links, including to copies of the Corona Anxiety Scale (CAS) and the Obsessions with Covid-19 scale (OCS) go to the Coronavirus Anxiety Project: https://sites.google.com/cnu.edu/coronavirusanxietyproject/home