Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study

Objectives To investigate the prevalence of depression in college students and determine how social support and healthy lifestyle factors are associated with depression in this population.Design A cross-sectional design.Setting A comprehensive university in Changsha, Hunan, South China. The study wa...

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Main Authors: Jing Lin, Zaili Tang, Shuidong Feng
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: BMJ Publishing Group 2021-07-01
Series:BMJ Open
Online Access:https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/7/e044236.full
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spelling doaj-65714653514a45e091c600222e6058892021-10-07T02:00:04ZengBMJ Publishing GroupBMJ Open2044-60552021-07-0111710.1136/bmjopen-2020-044236Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional studyJing Lin0Zaili Tang1Shuidong Feng2Xiangya International Academy of Translational Medicine, Central South University, Changsha, ChinaDepartment of Medical Record Management and Statistics, First Affiliated Hospital of University of South China, Hengyang, ChinaDepartment of Epidemiology & Health Statistics, University of South China, Hengyang, ChinaObjectives To investigate the prevalence of depression in college students and determine how social support and healthy lifestyle factors are associated with depression in this population.Design A cross-sectional design.Setting A comprehensive university in Changsha, Hunan, South China. The study was conducted from May to June 2019.Participants A total of 541 students at the comprehensive university.Primary and secondary outcome measures The Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale, Social Support Rating Scale and Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile-II (HPLP-II) were used to evaluate depression, social support and lifestyles, respectively, and analyse the mutual relationships among them.Results Among the 541 participants, 161 (29.8%) experienced depressive symptoms, and there were significant gender-related and academic discipline-related differences in self-rated depression. The average social support score was 38.06 (38.06±7.52). The average HPLP-II score was 71.09 (71.09±11.47). A monofactor analysis showed that depression was correlated with social support and a healthy lifestyle. As demonstrated by logistic regression analysis, being a woman (OR=2.613, 95% CI: 1.541 to 4.43), inadequate social support (OR=0.912, 95% CI: 0.877 to 0.948), poor nutrition (OR=0.87, 95% CI: 0.775 to 0.977) and lack of self-actualisation (OR=0.644, 95% CI: 0.572 to 0.724) were significantly correlated with depression.Conclusions Owing to the high prevalence of depression among Chinese university students, educational institutions must take measures such as providing compulsory mental health education courses and improving the psychological counselling services available to students.https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/7/e044236.full
collection DOAJ
language English
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Jing Lin
Zaili Tang
Shuidong Feng
spellingShingle Jing Lin
Zaili Tang
Shuidong Feng
Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
BMJ Open
author_facet Jing Lin
Zaili Tang
Shuidong Feng
author_sort Jing Lin
title Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
title_short Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
title_full Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
title_fullStr Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
title_full_unstemmed Depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
title_sort depression and its correlation with social support and health-promoting lifestyles among chinese university students: a cross-sectional study
publisher BMJ Publishing Group
series BMJ Open
issn 2044-6055
publishDate 2021-07-01
description Objectives To investigate the prevalence of depression in college students and determine how social support and healthy lifestyle factors are associated with depression in this population.Design A cross-sectional design.Setting A comprehensive university in Changsha, Hunan, South China. The study was conducted from May to June 2019.Participants A total of 541 students at the comprehensive university.Primary and secondary outcome measures The Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale, Social Support Rating Scale and Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile-II (HPLP-II) were used to evaluate depression, social support and lifestyles, respectively, and analyse the mutual relationships among them.Results Among the 541 participants, 161 (29.8%) experienced depressive symptoms, and there were significant gender-related and academic discipline-related differences in self-rated depression. The average social support score was 38.06 (38.06±7.52). The average HPLP-II score was 71.09 (71.09±11.47). A monofactor analysis showed that depression was correlated with social support and a healthy lifestyle. As demonstrated by logistic regression analysis, being a woman (OR=2.613, 95% CI: 1.541 to 4.43), inadequate social support (OR=0.912, 95% CI: 0.877 to 0.948), poor nutrition (OR=0.87, 95% CI: 0.775 to 0.977) and lack of self-actualisation (OR=0.644, 95% CI: 0.572 to 0.724) were significantly correlated with depression.Conclusions Owing to the high prevalence of depression among Chinese university students, educational institutions must take measures such as providing compulsory mental health education courses and improving the psychological counselling services available to students.
url https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/7/e044236.full
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AT shuidongfeng depressionanditscorrelationwithsocialsupportandhealthpromotinglifestylesamongchineseuniversitystudentsacrosssectionalstudy
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