Fig. 3. Psychological stress parameters. (A) The mean state anxiety scores in the stress and control groups. (B) The mean negative affect scores in the stress and control groups. (C) The mean positive affect scores in the stress and control groups.*p < .05,***p < .001.
Q1
A mixed-measures ANOVA for the negative affect scores (see Figure 3B), showed that there were significant main effects of Group, F (1, 61) = 6.05, p = .017, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\) = 0.09, and Time,F (4, 244) = 13.07, p < .001, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\) = 0.18. The interaction of Time and Group was also significant,F (4, 244) =8.59, p < .001, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\) = 0.12. Comparing the stress group to the control group using simple effects analyses (Bonferroni corrected), revealed that the MIST task significantly increased negative affect at the time points of S3 (p = .005), S4 (p = .008), and S5 (p = .004). A mixed-measures ANOVA for the positive affect scores (see Figure 3C), showed significant main effects of Time, F (4, 244) = 21.85,p < .001, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\) = 0.26, and Group,F (1, 61) = 4.73, p = .034, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\) = 0.07. The interaction of Time and Group was also significant, F (4, 244) = 4.81, p = .003, \(\eta_{p}^{2}\)= 0.07. Simple effect tests (Bonferroni corrected) revealed that positive affect in the stress group was significantly lower than that in the control group at S3 (p = .001), S4 (p = .049), and S5 (p = .005).