The linear and non-linear effects of cumulative Stressors and Traumas on Psychopathology: Are they mostly mediated by the centrality of event and existential anxieties

Abstract Objective The study aimed to clarify and refine the concepts of cumulative stressors and trauma (CST), the centrality of an event to an identity (COE), the existential annihilation anxieties (EAA), and psychopathology. The study aimed to propose and test a model in which CST affects psychopathology directly but mostly indirectly through COE and the four different types of identity-based EAA (personal/ psychic identity, collective identity, physical identity, and status identity EAA's). Further, the study aimed to replicate the previous finding that the non-linear model of CST's effects on internalizing, externalizing, and thought disorders (the psychopathology three major components) explains more variance than the linear model. Method Using path analysis, PROCESS mediation analysis, curve estimation regression, on a combined sample (N = 1566) from Egypt (N = 490), Turkey (N = 420), Kuwait (N = 300), Syria (N = 179), and the UK (N = 177), we tested the study assumptions. Results Status identity EAA and the other types of EAA related to different identities and COE mediated the major part of CST impact on psychopathology; with "status identity, EAA" had the strongest effect size. The non-linear model of the impact of CST's cumulative dynamics on psychopathology, internalizing, externalizing, thought disorders, and physical health accounted for much more variance than the linear model. Conclusions Results supported the proposed assumptions. The implications of these results for a paradigm shift in understanding stress and traumatization dynamics that go beyond the current linear approach with the sole focus on a single past stressor or traumatic stressor were discussed.