Strict nonselective quarantine and the prediction of suicidal thinking, hopelessness, and substance use in undergraduates: A longitudinal natural experiment 1000 km from a COVID-19 outbreak
Richard J. Linscott · 2025
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Description
Richard Linscott, a solo author, uses a sudden nationwide quarantine in New Zealand as a natural experiment on student mental health, in a 2025 paper. Psychology undergraduates far from any outbreak were surveyed every three days when one distant case triggered a strict two-week lockdown with hours of notice. The setup separates quarantine's own effects from fear of the virus itself.
Quarantine raised hopelessness modestly. It did not directly raise suicidal thinking or drug use, but it fed suicidal thinking indirectly through hopelessness. Baseline rates were already high, with large shares reporting recent ideation and drug use. The author argues hopelessness is the channel to watch in lockdown planning.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Richard J. Linscott |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2025 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 36 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |