Project Grant 2242591

This National Science Foundation (NSF) Division of Social and Economic Science Project Grant, titled "Coping with Compounding Risk and Uncertainty: A Longitudinal Study of Cascading Collective Stress in a Probability-Based-US Sample," is being awarded to the University of California Irvine (UC Irvine) for $1,018,693.00. The project commenced on June 15, 2023 and will run until May 31, 2026.

The primary objectives of this study are to: (1) examine how exposure to compounding collective traumas since early 2020 (e.g., pandemic, climate disasters) is associated with psychological and behavioral responses; (2) determine if individual trauma exposure moderates the association between compounding collective trauma and psychological/behavioral responses; and (3) assess whether personal stress related to collective stressors moderates the impact of compounding collective trauma exposure on psychological/behavioral responses.

To achieve these aims, the research team will conduct four additional surveys and a randomized experiment over the next 3 years with a nationally representative sample of over 6,500 U.S. residents from the NORC AmeriSpeak Panel. The study will assess respondents' psychological (e.g., risk perception, emotions) and behavioral (e.g., protective actions, civic engagement) reactions to the compounding crises during the project period. NORC, a non-profit research organization, will support this effort by overseeing participant recruitment, data collection, and processing.