Pandemic led to no prolonged spike in anxiety levels in the U.S., study indicates

Anxiety symptoms among U.S. adults, even during the COVID-19 pandemic, appear to have remained stable, according to a massive online study spanning more than a decade. The findings, published in Clinical Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, challenge assumptions that the pandemic caused a widespread, enduring spike in psychological distress.  

The study showed that implicit self-associations with anxiety, as captured in an online test, also remained steady. Young adults ages 18–25 showed significantly stronger anxiety symptoms and anxious self-concepts compared to older adults, but those levels did not increase over time.  

“Our results might suggest that the mental health of U.S. adults is more resilient than public perception suggests, given the many news headlines about the U.S. currently experiencing a ‘mental health crisis,’” said Noah French, a University of Virginia researcher and first author on the paper. 

But French cautioned against drawing firm conclusions from the results because of some limitations in the study. For example, the sample leaned younger and more educated than what may be represented in the general population. Participants also self-selected into the study, and people interested in learning about their implicit associations tied to anxiety might be different in some important ways from the general population. He called for future research that mitigates these limitations. 

“One of my biggest personal takeaways from this project is that there is surprisingly little high-quality research tracking the mental health of entire populations over time,” French said. “We need a lot more research in this space, and I will forever be skeptical of headlines that make strong claims about a certain mental health condition being ‘on the rise.’”  

French and his colleagues analyzed data from nearly 100,000 U.S. adults who visited the Project Implicit Health website between 2011 and 2022. Project Implicit Health offers assessments to help individuals explore their automatic, unconscious thoughts and reactions related to health. Participants completed self-report measures of anxiety symptoms and reaction-time tasks measuring implicit associations between the self and anxiety or calmness.  

The study used a continuous cross-sectional design, collecting data in real-time as participants voluntarily accessed the online platform over 11 years. This design allowed researchers to track subtle changes in anxiety outcomes over time and compare trends between younger adults (18–25) and those 26 and older. And the data collection overlapped with the emergence of COVID-19, which sparked a national public health emergency that lasted from January 2020 to May 2023.  

The researchers found no significant spike in anxiety symptoms or self-as-anxious associations at the start of the pandemic. Instead, the data showed relative consistency in anxiety levels, with younger adults consistently reporting and demonstrating stronger associations with anxiety than older adults throughout the study period. 

The research was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Science Foundation. 

Reference 

French, N. J., Freichel, R., Kahveci, S., Werntz, A., Howell, J. L., Lindgren, K. P., O’Shea, B. A., Boker, S. M., & Teachman, B. A. (2025). Anxiety symptom severity and implicit and explicit self-as-anxious associations in a large online sample of U.S. adults: Trends from 2011 to 2022. Clinical Psychological Science.