March 03, 2021 - 7:00 AM In the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 70 per cent of people reported experiencing significant psychological distress, with younger adults faring worse than the older generation, a recently published psychological study has found. University of British Columbia researchers found that 76 per cent of those surveyed reported at least one pandemic-related source of stress. UBC psychology professor Anita DeLongis oversaw the study and said she was shocked by the results. A psychologist and professor at the Centre for Health and Coping Studies at UBC, DeLongis has been studying people s behaviour during past global health threats going back to the SARS outbreak.