Elizabeth Brondolo

Introduction: Exposure to discrimination is associated with greater use of anger suppression (anger-in) and outward expression (anger-out), both of which are reflexive anger expression styles that are linked with relationship difficulties and poorer health. Social cognitive processes, such as heightened vigilance for social threats and rumination, may link discrimination to mental health, but little is known about the role of social cognition in the associations of discrimination to anger expression. Method: A racially diverse community sample ( n _analytic = 155, 67% women, 39% Black, 39% Latino/a, M _age = 39) self-reported racial discrimination (including two racial discrimination subtypes – stigmatization and physical threat), social vigilance, discrimination-based rumination, and discrimination-related anger expression at one time point. Results: Total (overall) discrimination was positively associated with reflexive but not reflective (anger-control) anger-expression. Tests of statistical mediation revealed significant indirect effects of rumination, but not social vigilance in the association of each type of discrimination to anger-out. Rumination also had a significant indirect effect in the relations of stigmatization to anger-in. In contrast, social vigilance demonstrated significant indirect associations between physical threat and anger-in. Discussion: Although the present work was cross-sectional and thus preliminary, findings suggest that racial discrimination is associated with anger expression styles via social cognitive factors. The pathways vary depending on the type of discrimination and the type of anger expression. Future work should include longitudinal studies to test mediation pathways. Examining social cognitive mediators of different types of discriminatory experiences to anger expression may guide the development of interventions to reduce the social costs of discrimination.

Background/Objectives: Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) is a methodology that offers a real-time approach to monitoring clinician well-being, but its utility during high-intensity operational periods remains underexplored. This study examines the feasibility and performance of an EMA-based system for tracking clinical responsibilities and burnout among healthcare workers during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: Utilizing an intensive longitudinal design, 398 healthcare workers, including physicians, physician assistants, nurses, and trainees, completed brief EMA surveys every five days from April 2020 to March 2021. Burnout was assessed with a validated single-item measure and analyzed in relation to redeployment status and hospital caseloads. Results: The EMA approach successfully captured meaningful temporal fluctuations in burnout. Redeployment was associated with higher burnout levels (b = 0.125; p = 0.01), and rising caseloads amplified this effect (interaction b = 0.169; p = 0.001). Nurses showed the strongest caseload-related increases in burnout (b = 0.359; p < 0.001). These patterns persisted even after individuals returned to their usual roles. Conclusions: This study demonstrates that EMA is a scalable and sensitive approach for continuous burnout surveillance, capable of detecting role-specific and context-dependent stress responses in real time. EMA-based monitoring can support early identification of at-risk groups, guide staffing and redeployment decisions, and inform timely organizational interventions during crises and other periods of operational strain.

Background/Objectives: This study evaluates the effectiveness of an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) tool for real-time monitoring of burnout among healthcare workers during times of crisis. Methods: Utilizing an intensive longitudinal design, 398 healthcare workers, including physicians, physician assistants, nurses, and trainees, were surveyed every five days over the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: The EMA approach successfully captured dynamic trends in burnout, identifying significant associations between workforce redeployment, elevated caseloads, and increased burnout, with effects persisting beyond a return to usual roles. Nurses were particularly vulnerable, reporting the highest burnout levels during periods of high patient volume. Conclusions: These findings validate EMA as an innovative and scalable method for continuous burnout surveillance, enabling the early identification of at-risk groups, guiding resource allocation, and informing timely interventions. This study highlights the critical role of real-time burnout monitoring tools in fostering workforce resilience and operational readiness during public health emergencies and other extended crises.

The Identity Vitality-Pathology (IVP) model is a novel theoretical framework that conceptualizes a modifiable health-determining construct, identity state, defined by three domains hypothesized to all stem from identification of the core self with the physical body: 1) a self-concept that is inclusive of all living beings vs. exclusive based on physical attributes, 2) the perceived basis of the worth of all living beings as intrinsic vs. extrinsic, and 3) the degree of universally compassionate orientation toward all living beings. The identity state construct is theorized to act through modulating stressor appraisal and stress-responsive behavior to influence the causal relationship between social position-dependent stressors, biological aging, and age-related diseases. The IVP Scale (IVPS) was developed to empirically assess the hypotheses of the IVP framework and the utility of the identity state construct for population health research. This study provides the first description of the psychometric properties of the long (20-item) and short form (12-item) IVPS. We used exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses (EFA and CFA) of data from two separate samples of self-identified Black and White adults (aged 18-81) collected in 2021 and 2025 (total N=2,318). Associations between the IVPS and related constructs of optimism, social dominance orientation (SDO), and resilience were examined to establish construct validity. EFA supported a unidimensional structure and CFA confirmed good model fit for both IVPS measures. Both scales are significantly positively correlated with indicators of optimism and resilience and significantly negatively correlated with SDO. These initial findings suggest the IVPS-20 and the IVPS-Short are valid and psychometrically sound scales.

Background: Depression is a leading contributor to morbidity and mortality in the U.S. While demographic risk patterns have persisted for decades, evolving sociopolitical contexts may drive disproportionate increases across groups. The Identity Vitality-Pathology (IVP) model posits that modifiable identity-related characteristics shape depression risk, with a vitalized identity—marked by an inclusive self-concept, intrinsic valuing of living beings, and universal compassion—protective against depression. This study examined the association between identity state and depression across Black and White women and men.Methods: Data came from 2,008 Black and White adults aged 35–65 in the 2025 Healthy Aging with Resilient Identities study. Stratified ordinal logistic regression models generated adjusted odds ratios (aORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for race-gender–specific predictors of depression.Results: Severe depression prevalence was highest among White men (9.3%), followed by White women (6.0%), Black women (3.8%), and Black men (3.2%). Higher IVP Scale (IVPS) scores—indicating greater identity vitality—were associated with lower odds of worse depression in all groups except White men. Compared to those with the lowest (Q1) IVPS scores, those in the highest (Q4) had 70% lower odds among Black women (aOR=0.3, 95% CI: 0.1, 0.6) and Black men (aOR=0.3, 95% CI: 0.1, 0.8), and 90% lower odds among White women (aOR=0.1, 95% CI: 0.03, 0.3), but little difference among White men (aOR=0.9, 95% CI: 0.5, 1.5).Conclusions: Findings suggest vitalized identity may reduce depression risk but also highlight the need for interventions attuned to the distinct racialized and gendered contexts shaping health.

Both age and gender have been identified as unique moderators of the association between negative interpersonal interactions and affective and physiological stress responses to these interactions. However, evidence is lacking on intersectional effects, with limited data on how gender differences in affective and physiological responses to interpersonal stress vary by age. The present study tests the hypothesis that age and gender interact to moderate the associations between acute exposure to negative interpersonal stressors and concurrent stress responses in daily life, assessed with measures of negative mood and ambulatory blood pressure (ABP). We tested this hypothesis using data from participants (N = 644) within the New York City metropolitan area. Participants identified as either Black (51.55%) or Latinx (48.45%); the sample was approximately half men (51.55%) and ages ranged between 23 and 65 (M = 39.20, SD = 9.51). Systolic and diastolic ABP data were measured every 20 min, and real-time encounters of negative interpersonal interactions and mood were assessed using ecological momentary assessment. We observed that younger women, when compared to older women, showed greater mood responses to negative interpersonal interactions. In contrast, older women, in comparison to all other groups, showed greater blood pressure (BP) responses to negative interpersonal interactions. These findings suggest that the way in which gender affects mood and BP responses to negative interpersonal interactions may vary across the lifespan. These findings provide developmental and mechanistic insight into affective and physiological responses and have implications for understanding the development of stress-related disorders. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

Health effects of structural racism occur on cultural and institutional levels and potentiate racism on an interpersonal level. Consequently, efforts to mitigate the health effects of racism may require intervention on all levels. The effectiveness of these approaches may depend partly on the degree to which they address the underlying patterns of social cognition, shaping social norms and influencing thoughts, feelings, and expectations about oneself, one's relationships with others, and interactions with the healthcare system. This paper aims to evaluate the current approaches to addressing structural racism (via racism and health statements and training programs in diversity, equity, and inclusion or cultural competence). These interventions work to shift social cognition, and consequently, shape social behavior in the healthcare context. Our goal is to identify ways to maximize the potential of these approaches to address social cognition to guide efforts to achieve a more inclusive and equitable healthcare system.

Background: Negative interpersonal interactions are associated with acute increases in ambulatory blood pressure (ABP). Yet, the mechanisms underlying this relationship are unclear. Purpose: This study tested whether negative interpersonal interactions predict higher ABP both in the moment and during subsequent observations, and whether increases in negative mood mediate these relations. These associations were tested among Black and Hispanic urban adults who may be at higher risk for negative interpersonal interactions as a function of discrimination. Race/ethnicity and lifetime discrimination were tested as moderators. Methods: Using a 24-hr ecological momentary assessment (EMA) design, 565 Black and Hispanic participants (aged 23–65, M = 39.06, SD = 9.35; 51.68% men) had their ABP assessed every 20 min during daytime accompanied by an assessment of negative interpersonal interactions and mood. This produced 12,171 paired assessments of ABP and self-reports of participants’ interpersonal interactions, including how much the interaction made them feel left out, harassed, and treated unfairly, as well as how angry, nervous, and sad they felt. Results: Multilevel models revealed that more intense negative interpersonal interactions predicted higher momentary ABP. Mediation analyses revealed that increased negative mood explained the relationship between negative interpersonal interactions and ABP in concurrent and lagged analyses. Discrimination was associated with more negative interpersonal interactions, but neither race/ethnicity nor lifetime discrimination moderated findings. Conclusions: Results provide a clearer understanding of the psychobiological mechanisms through which interpersonal interactions influence cardiovascular health and may contribute to health disparities. Implications include the potential for just-in-time interventions to provide mood restoring resources after negative interactions.

Frontline clinicians responding to the COVID-19 pandemic are at increased risk of burnout, but less is known about the trajectory of clinician burnout as caseloads increase and decrease. Personal and professional resources, including self-efficacy and hospital support, can attenuate the risk of burnout. Yet, empirical data documenting how burnout and resources changed as the pandemic waxed and waned are limited. This intensive longitudinal prospective study employed ecological momentary assessment methods to examine trajectories of burnout and resources over the pandemic’s first year in a New York City hospital. A 10-item survey was emailed every 5 days to frontline clinicians (physicians, nurses, and physician assistants). The primary outcome was a single-item validated measure of burnout; predictors included daily hospital COVID-19-related caseloads and personal and professional resources. Clinicians (n = 398) completed the initial survey and an average of 12 surveys over the year. Initially, 45.3% of staff reported burnout; over the year, 58.7% reported burnout. Following the initial COVID peak, caseloads declined, and burnout levels declined. During the second wave of COVID, as caseloads increased and remained elevated and personal and professional resource levels decreased, burnout increased. This novel application of intensive longitudinal assessment enabled ongoing surveillance of burnout and permitted us to evaluate how fluctuations in caseload intensity and personal and professional resources related to burnout over time. The surveillance data support the need for intensified resource allocation during prolonged pandemics.

Background: Racial/ethnic discrimination has been linked to poor health outcomes. Effects of discrimination on health behaviors, including patterns of food consumption, may contribute to health outcomes. Purpose: We examined relations of discrimination to consumption of healthy and unhealthy foods in two diverse samples. Structural equation modeling was used to examine variations in associations of discrimination to consumption by the timing and type of discrimination, for healthy vs. unhealthy food, and by sample. Methods: Study 1 included a racially and ethnically diverse sample of adults from New York City (NYC: N = 157); Study 2 included a sample of American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) adults from the Denver metro area (N = 303), many of whom also identified with other racial/ethnic groups. Participants completed self-report measures of racial/ethnic discrimination, food consumption, life stressors, and sociodemographic variables. Results: Structural equation models indicated discrimination was associated with food consumption. Tests of model invariance indicated that the model of discrimination to food consumption can be applied to both samples. Discrimination within the past-week was associated with more frequent consumption of both unhealthy and healthy foods, whereas lifetime discrimination was associated with more frequent consumption only of unhealthy foods. Conclusions: The data were limited to self-report measures and only the frequency of consumption was assessed. The findings suggest discrimination may contribute to health disparities through effects on food consumption. Differential effects for past-week and lifetime discrimination suggest that multiple mechanisms may be involved.