Socio-demographic Determinants and Prevalence of Depression, Anxiety, and Stress among Malaysian University Students

Prashanth, Talwar Yadar and Mohd Kamal, Othman and Abg Ekhsan, Abang Othman and Mohamed Sharif, Mustaffa and Yasir Hayat, Mughal (2017) Socio-demographic Determinants and Prevalence of Depression, Anxiety, and Stress among Malaysian University Students. Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, 43 (2). pp. 296-304. ISSN 0019-4247

PDF TALWARInJr.pdf Download (252kB)

Abstract

Prevalence of depression, anxiety, and stress amongst undergraduate university students may exert a significant, adversative effect on their health and wellbeing. The main objective of the current study was to identify and examine the socio-demographic determinants of depression, anxiety, and stress amongst undergraduate students from a public university in Sarawak, Malaysia. An exploratory cross-sectional study was conducted by administering a self-report English language questionnaire to 254 students. The first section of the questionnaire was utilized to garner information about socio-demographic characteristics, and the second section comprised of the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21). Results indicate a particularly high prevalence of anxiety amongst the respondents. The DASS-21 exhibited adequate reliability, with the three-factor model showing a good fit to the data from the current study. So far where the socio-demographic determinants are concerned, the results demonstrated that students receiving adequate parental social support were associated with higher stress. Poor relationship with parents was also found to be significantly associated with depression. It is anticipated that inferences drawn from this study could lead to a better understanding of the risk factors that imperil students.

Actions (For repository members only: login required)

View Item