AIP Sperimentale 2025, 31° Congresso annuale

Environmental effects on technostress and the role of the sense of self: a two-wave longitudinal survey in Italian university students

Sep 12, 2025, 9:35 AM

20m

Aula E2

Talk in simposio Thinking Climate, Feeling Nature: Psycho-Cognitive Dynamics

Speaker

Prof. Sjoerd Ebisch (G. d'Annunzio University of Chieti-Pescara; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging and Clinical Sciences)

Description

This study aims at testing the effect of subjective and objective environmental features on experiences of technostress in university students, and its hypothesized involved psychological mechanisms, in particular the sense of self and agency. N = 1188 students from 22 Italian universities were included. A two-wave data collection procedure was carried out via online surveys comprising two measurement points with an interval between three and six months. Psychometric questionnaires included: Perceived Restorativeness Scale (referring to home), Nature Contact Questionnaire, Connectedness with Nature Scale, Trait Sense of Self Inventory, Pleasure/Arousal/Dominance PAD questionnaire, General Health Questionnaire, and an ad hoc technostress questionnaire. Satellite imagery was employed to extract environmental features from the participants’ residential areas. Structural equation modeling was used for data analysis. The results showed that perceived residential restorativeness depends on nature contact, feelings of connectedness with nature and residential percentage grey/green spaces within a radius of 400 meters around one’s residence. Increased restorativeness in turn predicted less technostress, which was partly mediated by sense of self and PAD (decreased restorativeness, decreased sense of self and PAD, augmented technostress). Finally, sense of self, PAD and technostress predicted participant' general mental health. Model fit: CFI= .974; TLI= .966; PNFI= .743; RMSEA= [.031 .046]; BIC= 21627; R^2 GHQ = .605; R^2 technostress = .082; R^2 self trait = .059; R^2 PAD = .248. These findings open a new window in the role of the sense of self and agency in mediating the relationship between environmental variables and mental health, and in particular technostress.