Comparison of the status of mental health between 4 387 freshmen and Chinese norms as well as sex difference
- VernacularTitle:大学新生4 387名心理健康状况与国内常模及性别差异的比较
- Author:
Li LI
- Publication Type:Journal Article
- From:
Chinese Journal of Tissue Engineering Research
2006;10(2):169-171
- CountryChina
- Language:Chinese
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Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Every year there are case reports about freshmen who took extreme actions because of maladaptation. Freshmen's mental health is related not only to their adaptability to university life but also to the stability and harmony of university campus.OBJECTIVE: To investigate the level of freshmen's mental health in early university life and screen out the students with severe psychological problems.DESIGN: A cross-sectional study.SETTING: Department of Education, Shaoxing University of Zhejiang Province.PARTICIPANTS: A total of 4 417 freshmen of year 2003 from Shaoxing University were selected as observational subjects during November 2003.METHODS: The status of mental health was surveyed with symptom checklist-90 (SCL-90), self-rated anxiety scale (SAS), and self-rated depression scale (SDS). SCL-90 consisted of 9 dimensions: somatization, obsessive-compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, hostility,phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation and psychoticism, and 5 evaluation scales: 1 as none, 2 as mild, 3 as moderate, 4 as severe and 5 as rather severe. The higher the score, the lower the level of psychological health was. They were evaluated as whether they had problem of psychological health or not. SAS contained 4 grades that recorded mainly the frequency of the appearing symptoms defined by the evaluation entry. The standard score took 50 points as the critical point. The higher the score, the more severe anxiety status was. The main statistical index of SDS was the exponent of depression severity that ranged from 0.25 to 1.00. Those with less than 0.05 had no depression, 0.50-0.59 mild depression, 0.60-0.69moderate depression, and above 0.70 severe depression. The group test was conducted among the freshmen 3 months after they entered the university.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The scores of SCL-90, SAS and SDS.RESULTS: A total of 4 417 questionnaires were sent out, and 4 387questionnaires were collected with the effective rate of 99.32%. ① The scores on obsessive-compulsive, phobic anxiety and psychoticism ih the freshmen were higher than those of the norms (t=2.88-4.82, P ＜ 0.01). Among them, 333 freshmen with common psychological problems were detected, which constituted 7.59%. Another 49 students with severe psychological problems were screened out, which made up 1.12%. ② There were significant sex differences of scores in SCL-90 factors between boys and girls (total average t=5.56, P ＜ 0.01). ③ There was a significant correlation of depression and anxiety of SCL-90 scores with the standard scores of SDS and SAS, respectively, and the coefficient of product-moment correlation was 0.532 and 0.361, respectively.CONCLUSION: ① The freshmen did not have good psychological health.② The girls had more psychological problems than the boys. ③ The scores on depression and anxiety of SCL-90 were mutual proof with the standard scores of SDS and SAS, respectively.
