Patterns of attentional biases in children and emotional symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic: a two-wave longitudinal study

Background It is unknown how the patterns of negative and positive attentional biases in children predict fear of COVID-19, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study identifed profles of negative and positive attentional biases in children and examined their association with emotional symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Method 264 children (girls: 53.8% and boys: 46.2%) of 9–10 years born in Hong Kong or mainland China from a primary school in Shenzhen, People’s Republic of China were involved in a two-wave longitudinal study. Children completed the COVID-19 Fear Scale, the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale, and the Attention to Positive and Negative Information Scale to measure fear of COVID-19, anxiety and depression symptoms, and negative and positive attentional biases in classrooms. After six months, they completed the second assessment of fear of COVID-19, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms in classrooms. Latent profle analysis was conducted to reveal distinct profles of attentional biases in children. A series of repeated MANOVA was performed to examine the association of
profles of attentional biases to fear of COVID-19, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms across 6 months.
Results Three profles of negative and positive attentional biases were revealed in children. Children with a “moderate positive and high negative attentional biases” profle had signifcantly higher fear of the COVID-19 pandemic, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms than children with a “high positive and moderate negative attentional biases” profle. Children with a “low positive and negative attentional biases” profle were not signifcantly diferent in fear of COVID-19, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms than those with the other two profles.
Conclusions Patterns of negative and positive attentional biases were related to emotional symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. It might be important to consider children’s overall patterns of negative and positive attentional biases to identify children at risk of higher emotional symptoms.
© 2023, The Author(s).