Anxiety and watching the war in Ukraine

Abstract

On 24 February 2022, Russia attacked Ukraine. Millions of people tuned into social media to watch the war. Media exposure to disasters and large-scale violence can precipitate anxiety resulting in intrusive thoughts. This research investigates factors related to anxiety while watching the war. Since the war began during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, threat from COVID-19 is seen as a predictor of anxiety when watching the war. A theoretical model is put forward where the outcome was anxiety when watching the war, and predictors were self-reported interference of watching the war with one's studies or work, gender, worry about the war, self-efficacy and coronavirus threat. Data were collected online with independent samples of university students from two European countries close to Ukraine, Germany (n = 348) and Finland (n = 228), who filled out an anonymous questionnaire. Path analysis was used to analyse the data. Findings showed that the model was an acceptable fit to the data in each sample, and standardised regression coefficients indicated that anxiety, when watching the war, increased with interference, war worry and coronavirus threat, and decreased with self-efficacy. Women reported more anxiety when watching the war than men. Implications of the results are discussed.