ArticleHeliyon2022
The effect of cyberchondria on anxiety, depression and quality of life during COVID-19: the mediational role of obsessive-compulsive symptoms and Internet addiction.
Article in Heliyon, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 34 citations in OpenAlex.
- Factors Associated With Health Perception and Psychological Well-Being Among Third-Age University Students: Cross-Sectional Study on the Role of Cyberchondria.JMIR human factors · 2026Article
- Knowledge, Attitudes, and Behaviors Towards Cyberchondria: A Cross-Sectional Study Among Italian Adolescents.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Trends in the Implementation of the Cyberchondria Severity Scale: Bibliometric Analysis.JMIR mental health · 2026Article
- Impact of Cyberchondria on Health and Quality of Life: Scoping Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Predictors of Illness Behavior in Turkish Women with Cardiovascular Disease: The Role of Health Anxiety and Cyberchondria.Journal of clinical psychology in medical settings · 2025Article
- Cyberchondria in Older Adults and Its Relationship With Cognitive Fusion, Health-Related Quality of Life, and Mental Well-Being: Mediation Analysis.JMIR aging · 2025Article
- Does Cyberchondria Influence Subjective Well-Being in Online Healthcare platforms?-An Empirical Study.Psychology research and behavior management · 2025Article
- The Moderating Role of Health Literacy and Health Promoting Behavior in the Relationship Among Health Anxiety, Emotional Regulation, and Cyberchondria.Psychology research and behavior management · 2024Article
- Article
- Cyberchondria: a Growing Concern During the COVID-19 Pandemic and a Possible Addictive Disorder?Current addiction reports · 2023Review
- Social Support Mediates the Association between Health Anxiety and Quality of Life: Findings from a Cross-Sectional Study.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Internet Derived Information Obstruction Treatment (IDIOT) Syndrome: A Breviloquent Review.Cureus · 2022Review
- How cyberchondria and decision self-efficacy shapes the acceptability of COVID-19 vaccine: A gender-based comparison.Digital healthArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Since the global pandemic of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), online health information-seeking behaviors have notably increased. Cyberchondria can be a vulnerability factor for the worsening of anxiety-depressive symptoms and quality of life. The current study aims to understand the predictive effect of cyberchondria on health anxiety, anxiety, depression and quality of life considering the mediating effect of obsessive-compulsive symptoms and Internet addiction and the moderating effect of COVID anxiety. 572 Italian participants (66% female; Mean age = 34; SD = 15) took part in a cross-sectional online survey involving CSS-12, MOCQ-R, IAT, SHAI, HADS, WHOQoL-BREF and CAS. Mediation and moderation analyses were conducted. Obsessive-compulsive symptoms and Internet addiction were found to partially mediate the cyberchondria-health anxiety and the cyberchondria-anxiety links and to totally mediate the cyberchondria-depression and the cyberchondria-quality of life links. COVID anxiety was found to moderate the relationship between cyberchondria and anxiety. The findings suggest that compulsivity may have a key role in the explanation of the underlying mechanisms of cyberchondria. Healthcare practitioners should provide additional support for individuals with cyberchondria. As such, cyberchondria is a contributing factor to the exacerbation of anxiety-depressive disorders and may impact on the quality of life.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.