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Welcome to our 4th newsletter! DynaMORE is an international research project that aims to promote stress resilience and improve mental health and well-being in the face of adversity. It is spearheaded by Prof. Dr. Raffael Kalisch from the Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research (LIR) and the University Medical Center Mainz (UMC-MAINZ) and funded by the European HORIZON 2020 Research and Innovation Programme. If you are receiving this newsletter as a forwarded message but would like to actively subscribe enter your email address here. You can unsubscribe at any time.
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3rd GA meeting & New website features
Due to the Corona crisis, the 3rd DynaMORE General Assembly (GA) meeting, originally planned in Warsaw (Poland), took place remotely from home offices and living rooms on 29-30 April 2020. Same people, same smiles though!
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A couple of new features have been added to the DynaMORE website to make our research more transparent and accessible. You will find two new navigation items in the main menu, namely "Our studies" and "Results" (see image below). Under "Our studies", we created a central landing page for the DynaCORE study, which - depending on the language-availability - leads either to the DynaCORE-L survey (app-based 6-week-online study) or to the DynaCORE-C study (one-time survey). Under "Results", website visitors can view background literature and DynaMORE publications, access public deliverables that were submitted to the European Commission, read summary reports of past research periods, and download dissemination materials.
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COVID-19 mental health advice
The Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research ( LIR) in Mainz, Germany, assembled 10 key recommendations for strengthening one's mental health during the current coronavirus pandemic. You may find them helpful as well:
- Handle information with care. Search specifically at trustworthy sources like the Robert Koch Institute or the WHO for information. Remember that the situation is dynamic and information evolves and changes. Take regular information breaks to switch off.
- Maintain your routines or develop new ones. Make sure to have a varied daily structure. Set fixed times for eating and getting up. Call your friends, go for a walk or read a book.
- Maintain social contacts. Communication with and trust in others are essential in times of crisis and are particularly important. Use networking opportunities such as email, video telephony or chat programs and keep in touch.
- Accept the complexity of the situation. Develop an accepting attitude for the current situation, to release energy for other areas on which you have influence over. In this way, you can gradually free yourself from stressful thoughts.
- Take care of yourself. Get enough sleep, eat a healthy diet, and exercise sufficiently. Avoid harmful strategies, such as the consumption of alcohol or other substances to regulate your emotions.
- Take responsibility. You have a significant influence on your fellow human beings in times of crisis. Take care of your friends, family, and especially old people. Offer support and help each other.
- Reduce stress regularly. Use sports or relaxation techniques (mindfulness, progressive muscle relaxation, …) to reduce stress and recover.
- Be open with your children. Talk to your children, reassure them that you are there and are taking care of them. Discuss your plans for the next weeks. Keep calm and clarify open questions.
- Prepare for isolation. Think of this as a time out where you can shape your day in a self-determined way. Use the time to reflect on yourself. Ensure entertainment through books, games or by learning new things. Talk to your partner or family about what happens if you should argue.
- Seek professional help with acute stress. If, for example, panic or depression becomes unendurable, contact a local patient counseling center. If you have acute suicidal thoughts, please contact the emergency service of your local psychiatric hospital or emergency services immediately.
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Resilience in Corona times: First empirical insights from Europe
The first results of how people are coping with the Corona crisis are in! Potential resilience factors, exposure to Corona-specific and general stressors, as well as internalizing symptoms were assessed online in 5000 adult Europeans: In comparison with other resilience factors, positive appraisal specifically of the consequences of the Corona crisis was the single strongest resilience factor. Positive appraisal style (PAS) was not only positively associated with resilience (p<0.001) but also mediated the positive association between perceived social support (PSS) and resilience (p<0.001). Resilience, as an outcome, was conceptualized as good mental health despite stressor exposure. Therefore, PAS and PSS can be seen as important modifiable protective factors that can be targeted by public mental health efforts in similar crisis situations in the future.
Associations of hypothesized resilience factors with outcome-based resilience (RES) and mediation effects.Click on the image to access and read the original publication.
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How are YOU coping with the Corona crisis?
The Corona crisis as a chance to strengthen your own resilience & to participate in resilience research: If you are 18 or older you can participate in our COVID-19 mental health study! If you like it, please also tell your friends, colleagues, and social network about it. We highly appreciate your help. Let’s aim to spread this survey study faster than the virus & thank you for advancing our knowledge about human resilience in times of a crisis.
With your help and anonymous study participation, we will be one step closer to improving general health by investigating the psychological mechanisms that allow us to deal with a crisis like this virus pandemic. Click on the image to participate.
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Announcement: DRZ is now a Leibniz Institute!
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The German Resilience Center (DRZ) in Mainz has become the Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research ( LIR) in January 2020. Germany’s science ministers have officially granted the DRZ inclusion into one of the country’s most prestigious associations of non-university research institutions. The LIR will receive several million Euros annual funding exclusively for resilience research, in renewable 7-year funding periods. The LIR aims at being a nucleus for resilience research in Europe and will actively engage in creating transnational research networks.
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New team members
We cordially welcome Sophie Bögemann, Avigail Lerner, Lara Puhmann, Aleksandra Uściłko, Emmanuel Rios Velazquez, and Annelies Goris as new members of the DynaMORE research team: |
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Sophie Bögemann recently joined the research team at the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Behaviour at Radboud University Medical Centre ( SKU) as a PhD student. She is closely working with Dr. Judith van Leeuwen, Dr. Erno Hermans, and gave the project's social media presence a real boost!
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Avigail Lerner works as a research assistant in the group of Prof. Dr. Talma Hendler at Tel Aviv University ( TAU). She studied psychology and cognition at Ben Gurion University and majored in neuroscience. As a student, she worked at various research labs and as a counselor in a hostel for people coping with mental illnesses. After graduating, she worked in the biomedical industry but now decided to return to academia and focus on psychological research.
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Goodbye, former team members!
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We are sad to see Dr. Zuzana Kasanova leave the project. She was part of the team around Prof. Dr. Inez Myin-Germeys at the Centre for Contextual Psychiatry (CCP) at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven ( KUL) and contributed important input for work package 5 ( WP5) to develop the software platform of the Ecological Momentary Assessments (EMAs) and Ecological Momentary Interventions (EMIs). |
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Jonas Albert, a senior researcher at Inter-universitair Micro-Electronica Centrum ( IMEC) in Leuven, Belgium, has also left the project. He was part of the team around Dr. Chris van Hoof and Walter de Raedt who provide the smartwatch technology used in the DynaMORE project.
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New publications
Two new manuscripts that were directly funded by the DynaMORE project were published so far in 2020, and more are already in preparation. Feel free to click on the titles below to access the original publications. Congrats to the authors!
DynaMORE publications:
Kalisch et al. (2020) suggest a novel way of assessing an individual's mental health reactivity to stressor exposure (‘stressor reactivity’) in longitudinal studies. Click on the figure to access the original publication.
Other recent publications by consortium members:
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Save the dates!
10th European Conference on Positive Psychology (ECPP)
24 - 27 June 2020
Reykjavik, Iceland
The theme of the conference is “Creating a world we want to live in”. The conference is a platform to present the latest research and its application within the field of positive psychology. It is a unique opportunity for scholars and practitioners to meet and discuss challenges and opportunities within the field of positive psychology from all over the world. ECPP 2020 will cover three main aspects of Positive Psychology: Theory and basic research, applied research, and practice.
6th International Symposium on Resilience Research
23 - 25 September 2020
Mainz, Germany
Contact: Martina Diehl
Participants are invited to submit poster abstracts (max. 300 words, please give full author list and affiliations) via e-mail. Abstract deadline: July 1st. Suitable posters by young researchers are selected for short talks. Please indicate your age when submitting. Speakers will be reimbursed for their travel expenses. The best poster will receive a poster award (300 €). Registration deadline: August 1st.
6th DynaMORE Steering Committee (SC) Meeting
26 - 27 October 2020
via GoToMeeting (REMOTE)
Contact: Vanessa Köhler
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DynaMORE in the press & on social media
Lots of online and print articles, podcasts, TV coverage, blog posts, and social media activity have accompanied the DynaMORE project lately. For a collective list of all press coverage since the start of the project, please visit the subpage "Press coverage" on our website. Much of the public interest was based on the desire for professional advice regarding mental health and psychological resilience in this time of crisis and the related COVID-19 mental health study (DynaCORE). Below is a selection of featured press coverage from the past weeks. You can click on the respective news-outlet logo to read a recent article, listen to a podcast, or watch a TV clip regarding the Corona-related DynaMORE mental health studies in various languages, including Croatian, Dutch, English, German, Norwegian, Polish, and Spanish / Catalan.
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Image subtitled "We can all discover new strengths within ourselves" in the printed interview of Prof. Dr. Raffael Kalisch for the Austrian newspaper KURIER from 05 April 2020.
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Since March 2020, DynaMORE has not only been extremely active on the already existing Twitter account @DynaMORE_H2020 but is now also represented on Facebook and Instagram. By sharing more insights about our goals, our studies, our results, and the researchers behind DynaMORE, by posting meme-styled mental health advice in order to deal more easily with this unprecedented and unusual pandemic, and by encouraging more interaction, commenting, and sharing of individual experiences, we aim to communicate more directly with young people and the general public. For updates on resilience research in general, follow @ResilienceRes on Twitter! |
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