A remote examination of acute stress responses: examining the influence of psychological resilience.

Background: A few studies have examined psychological resilience as a predictor of physiological responses to acute stress; however, no studies have directly examined psychological resilience as a moderator of subjective responses to acute stress.

Methods: Adults were recruited to participate in an acute stress response study that was conducted remotely. Demographics, psychological resilience, nicotine use and desire to quit, and information related to cannabis use were measured during a medical screening session. Positive, stressed, and anxious moods were measured during baseline rest prior to acute stress, after performing acute stress tasks, and after 30- and 55-minutes of post-stress recovery during an acute stress session.

Results: Acute stress was successfully induced during the remote audio-video stress session. There were significant increases in stressed and anxious moods and significant decreases in positive mood immediately after the acute stress tasks, followed by a return to baseline levels of these moods. Moreover, psychological resilience was inversely related to stressed and anxious moods reported at baseline and immediately after acute stress. In addition, psychological resilience was positively related to positive mood.

Conclusion: The results are consistent with previous research linking psychological resilience to general reports of positive and negative affect. Further, the results demonstrate, for the first time, that psychological resilience may be a significant predictor of negative mood immediately after acute stress.