Psychological distress among Japanese high school students during the COVID-19 pandemic: An energy landscape analysis
By revealing associations between the COVID-19 pandemic and lower levels of psychological distress and healthier mental health states, our work demonstrates the potential of using dynamical systems theory, such as the energy landscape analysis, to interpret health and disease metrics in psychology and psychiatry. This approach may improve mental health surveillance for the next pandemic.
Authors
- Masato Abe (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0468-1179)
- Atsushi Nishida
- Daiki Tatematsu
- Takahiro Ezaki (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4175-3028)
- Naohiro Okada
- Shinsuke Koike
- Tetsuo Ishikawa
- Kiyoto Kasai
- Naoki Masuda
- Kazuyuki Aihara
- Eiryo Kawakami
- Naotoshi Nakamura
- Shingo Iwami
- Lin Cai
Institutions
- Doshisha University (JP)
- Kyushu University (JP)
- Chiba University (JP)
- Keio University (JP)
- Kyoto University (JP)
- University of Michigan (US)
- Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Medical Science (JP)
- RIKEN (JP)
- Department of Mathematical Sciences (RU)
- RIKEN Center for Advanced Intelligence Project (JP)
- Science Groove (Japan) (JP)
- RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences (JP)
- Japanese Foundation For Cancer Research (JP)
- Nagoya University (JP)
- The University of Tokyo (JP)
- Nara Institute of Science and Technology (JP)
- Yokohama City University (JP)
Publication Details
- Journal
- PLoS Medicine
- Published
- 2026-01-22
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1004884
- Primary Topic
- Mental Health Research Topics
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development
- Japan Prize Foundation
- Secom Science and Technology Foundation
- University of Tokyo
- Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
- Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology
- JST-Mirai Program
- Moonshot Research and Development Program