Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has threatened peoples’ health and social life, and also exerted a great impact on national and personal income. During major public emergencies, people’s social emotions and mentality changes as the pandemic progresses. However, the pandemic would not affect all social members in a similar way. Previous research has demonstrated that social class has a profound influence on individuals’ social cognition, emotion, and behavior. Facing the pandemic, people in low social class have relatively less access to public and private resources, which may lead to more psychological distress and physical symptoms. Since mid-February, China has rolled out active precaution measures while resuming production and work gradually and safely. During this period of post-pandemic, the people in low social class may confront a higher risk of unemployment and perceive higher economic stress. The present study aims to investigate how people from different social classes might perceive and respond to stress during work resumption and to explore how their social emotions and perceived stress change over time. We conducted online surveys among Shanghai citizens at three time points approximately one week apart, with 1073 adults participating in the first survey (T1), 983 adults participating in the second survey (T2), and 1078 adults participating in the third survey (T3). Since Chi-square and One-Way ANOVA showed that there were significant differences in demographic variables among the three samples, we added the control variables (i.e., gender and age) in the following analyses. We measured social class indexed by income and education level and social emotion including positive affect and negative affect at all three time points. Besides, we measured perceived stress (i.e., safety-related stress and economic stress) and the desire to back to work at T2 and T3. All the measures showed good reliabilities and validities in the current study. The results indicated that: (1) Participants experienced higher levels of positive affect than negative affect at three time points during work resumption (Total, t(3133) = 34.15, p < .001, d = 0.61；T1, t(1072) = 8.03, p < .001, d = 0.25; T2, t(982) = 24.06, p < .001, d = 0.77; T3, t(1077) = 30.87, p < .001, d = 0.94). Also, participants’ emotions became more and more positive over time, manifested by increased positive affect (T2 > T1, β = 0.20, p < .001; T3 > T2, β = 0.09, p < .001) and reduced negative affect (T2 < T1, β = -0.22, p < .001; T3 < T2, β = -0.07, p = .002). (2) The relationship between social class and positive affect was significant (β = 0.08, p < .001), and the relationship between social class and negative affect was also significant (β = -0.15, p < .001), indicating that low social class people were less positive and more negative than their higher-class counterparts. The interaction between measuring time and social class was not significant. (3) Participants perceived less safety-related stress over time (β = -0.05, p = .028), but experienced almost same level of economic stress (β = -0.001, p = .96). Besides, social class was positively related to safety-related stress (β = 0.06, p = .012), while negatively related to economic stress (β = -0.13, p < .001), indicating that low-social class individual was more likely to suffer from economic stress, while high-social class individual experienced more safety-related stress. There was no significant interaction between measuring time and social class on either safe-related stress or economic stress. (4) We found that people in lower social class have stronger desire to get bact to work (β = -0.16, p = .004). (5) Safety-related stress significantly mediated between social class and positive affect (indirect effect = -.004, 95% CI [-.016, -.001]) and negative affect (indirect effect = .018, 95% CI [.012, .057]), while ecnomic stress significantly mediated between social class and negative affect (indirect effect = -.032, 95% CI [-.080, -.038]). The current study has found significant differences in social emotion and perceived stress between different social classes. People in lower social class were more negative and perceived higher economic stress, while the higher social class population was more anxious about safety. These findings have a compelling implication on implementing targeted policies which help the lower social class population to cope with, resist, and recover economically from the major public emergencies and regain their positive emotions and happiness.

Key words: Major Public Emergencies, social emotion, social class, safety-related stress, economic stress

摘要： 本研究考察新冠肺炎疫情复工阶段，不同阶层社会情绪和压力因素随时间的变化规律。基于三次问卷调查（NT1 = 1073; NT1 = 983; NT3 =1078）发现：（1）民众社会情绪均表现为积极情绪高于消极情绪，而且随时间推进社会情绪持续向好；（2）低阶层者的社会情绪始终比高阶层者更消极；（3）民众感知的安全压力随时间下降，而经济压力随时间没有显著变化；（4）低阶层者感知到更大的经济压力，高阶层者感知到更大的安全压力；（5）安全压力在社会阶层与积极情绪和消极情绪之间起显著的中介作用，经济压力在社会阶层与消极情绪之间起显著的中介作用。研究揭示了不同社会阶层在复工阶段存在社会情绪和压力来源的差异，为有针对性进行积极社会心态治理提供启示。

关键词: 重大突发公共卫生事件, 社会阶层, 社会情绪, 安全压力, 经济压力