Using a cross-sectional design, this study aimed to examine the associations between personal resources and emotional exhaustion, with anxiety as a potential variable consistent with a mediating role.

Data was collected in Lebanon over a six month period using validated self-report questionnaires. Workers aged 18 to 64 years (N = 295) were recruited using a non-randomized snowball sampling approach. Multiple regression and mediation analyses were conducted.

The findings indicate that personal resources (sleep quality (b = −0.224, 95% CI [−0.286, −0.165]), emotional intelligence (b = −0.061, 95% CI [−0. 112, −0.007]), and internal locus of control (b = −0.216, 95% CI [−0. 351, −0.075]) were all negatively associated with anxiety, supporting Hypothesis 1. Sleep quality (b = 0.073, 95% CI [−0.125, −0.029]) and internal locus of control (b = −0.071, 95% CI [−0.140, −0.018])) were also associated with lower emotional exhaustion through their associations with lower anxiety levels (i.e., indirect association via anxiety). In contrast, emotional intelligence (b = −0.020, 95% CI [−0.046, 0.002]) showed no significant indirect association with emotional exhaustion (i.e., no indirect association via anxiety).

The results of this study highlight that not all personal resources have uniformly positive effects.

A rise in loneliness among older adults since the COVID-19 outbreak, even after vaccination, has been highlighted. Loneliness has deleterious consequences, with specific effects on perceptions of the ageing process during the COVID-19 pandemic. Coping with stressful life events and the challenges of ageing may result in a perception of acceleration of this process.

Studies have shown a buffering effect of an internal locus of control in the relationship between COVID-19 stress and mental distress. The current study examined whether loneliness predicts subjective accelerated ageing and whether internal locus of control moderates this relationship.

Two waves of community-dwelling older adults (M = 70.44, s.d. = 5.95; age range 61–88 years), vaccinated three times, were sampled by a web-survey company. Participants completed the questionnaire after the beginning of the third vaccination campaign and reported again 4 months later on loneliness, internal locus of control and subjective accelerated ageing level in the second wave.

Participants with higher levels of loneliness presented 4 months later with higher subjective accelerated ageing. Participants with a low level of internal locus of control presented 4 months later with high subjective accelerated ageing, regardless of their loneliness level. Participants with a high level of internal locus of control and a low level of loneliness presented with the lowest subjective accelerated ageing 4 months later.

The findings emphasise the deleterious effects of loneliness and low internal locus of control on older adults’ perception of their ageing process. Practitioners should focus their interventions not only on loneliness but also on improving the sense of internal locus of control to improve subjective accelerated ageing.