Living Space and Job Prospects and Their Relationship with Subjective Well-Being during COVID-19 Confinement in Spain: The Mediator Role of Resilience

Molero, Fernando; Recio, Patricia; Sarriá, Encarnación

The objective of this study was to examine the relationships of participants’ home characteristics (living space) and job prospects after the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic to their subjective psychological well-being (SWB) (in terms of both affective and cognitive aspects). We also examined the role of participants’ resilience as a possible mediator in the relationships among the aforementioned variables. The sample comprised 474 Spanish adults who completed an online questionnaire between 14 and 24 April 2020, when COVID-19 confinement was very strict in Spain. We proposed a path analysis model including the described variables. The model presented a good fit (χ(2) = 7.41, df = 5, p = 0.376, comparative fit index = 0.996, Tucker–Lewis index = 0.987; root mean square error of approximation = 0.032). The results indicated that living space and future job prospects predicted resilience, which, in turn, was related to SWB. Moreover, the bootstrapping results revealed a mediating effect of resilience that showed indirect relationships between living space and SWB and between job prospects and SWB. Our results underline the importance of environmental (living space) and job-related variables to predict SWB as well as the mediating role that resilience may play during the confinement period.