2023/07/25 by Agata Błachnio, Aneta Przepiórka, Paweł Kot +2 · 8 citations
Medicine · Psychology · #Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes #Clinical psychology #Cognition #Distress #Harm #Mental Health Research Topics #Psychiatry #Psychology #Psychosomatic Disorders and Their Treatments #Rumination #Social psychology #Stress (linguistics)
paper · doi:10.1016/j.actpsy.2023.103946
published in Acta Psychologica 238, 103946 (Elsevier BV)
openalex publication_date 2023/07/25 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Cyberchondria, defined as excessive concern about one's health and looking for solutions to health problems on the Internet, is becoming increasingly common. This paper examines the relations between the dimensions of stress appraisal (threat, challenge-activity, challenge-passivity, harm/loss) and cyberchondria. We also tested whether these relations were mediated by rumination. The study included a nonclinical sample of N = 615 participants aged 18 to 83 years (M = 43.86, SD = 14.57, 53 % women), who completed the short version of the Cyberchondria Severity Scale, the Rumination Scale, and the Stress Appraisal Questionnaire. We used the Computer-Assisted Web Interview (CAWI) method. The results revealed that rumination was a partial mediator between stress as a threat and cyberchondria and between stress as a harm/loss and cyberchondria. Cyberchondria was positively related to rumination, stress as a threat, and stress as a harm/loss and negatively related to the challenge-activity dimension of stress appraisal. The study indicates that stress appraisal is linked to cyberchondria and that rumination plays an important role in this relationship.