ay in Our study intended to identify whether students are more likely to experience depressive symptoms compared to non-students. Therefore, both groups completed a questionnaire regarding their mental health. However, our results illustrated that student do not experience depressive symptoms more, so our results were not statistically significant. Our results did not support other prior research, so we could do further research and replicate the study by making improvements such as using student from different years.
Introduction
We presently live in a world where every 1 in 4 people are suffering from some mental illness. Our study clearly underscores that fact that mental disorders are common among college students (Auberbach et al., 2018) but is this number affected by factors such as whether they are in education or not?
Depression is considered as a multi-problematic disorder that leads to impairment in interpersonal, social and occupational functioning (Sadock & Kaplan., 2007). Therefore, having a depressive disorder can hinder our capability to carry out activities in our life that we can typically do well. Symptoms include sadness, loss of interest, worthlessness, fatigue, movement (agitation) and suicidal ideation.
Studies conducted in the past have demonstrated that rates of depression in undergraduates’ students have increased over time (Ceyhan et al.,2009; Denise et al., 1996) implying that the stress, workload and other factors such as moving away from home could make them more prone to depression.
In our current study, participants had to complete questionnaires in order for us to compare the difference in their responses. Our alternative hypothesis states that if you are a student you will experience more depressive symptoms compared to non-students. This might be due to the fact that students experienced additional stress concerning their futures and employment or that they were less satisfied with their studies. It might also indicate that being a student is one of the factors that predispose to depression (NIHM., 2009).
Method
Participants
193 psychology undergraduates from Brunel University were recruited through an opportunity sample and 88 non-students recruited from prolific. The total sample is 301, however 5 ages were eliminated in order to preserve participant anonymity. The data was only available for 281 participants (so the data of 20 participants was not recorded as they missed out a question so there total CESD-r score wasn’t recorded). Out of the 301 participants, 228 were females and 73 were male.
The mean age was 20.40 (SD=2.83, range=18)
Materials
Participants gave consent before partaking in the study which was given through them ticking a box before beginning the study which says, ‘I confirm and agree to participate.’ Additionally, they had to confirm that they were 18 years of age and had read the ‘about this survey’ text and were informed that they will not be referred to by name in any report and that they are free to withdraw at any point with giving any reason. The individuals were given a questionnaire that comprised of 30 questions regarding their mental health specifically about depression and their general personality. It was carried out in groups in a computer room at Brunel University London. Overall, the participants took around 5 minutes to complete the questionnaire and the questions were rated on a 6-point scale which had responses including: not at all/less than one day last week, one/two days last week, three/four days last week, five to seven days last week, nearly every day for the last two weeks and prefer not to answer.
Design and procedure
The independent variable of this study was the type of participant so whether or not they were a student, and the dependant variable was the score that they got on the questionnaire measured by the CESD-r, and a between groups design was used.
The procedure went as followed: firstly, the participants had to read through a consent form and tick the box agreeing to it. In order to complete this study, they were using computers at Brunel University and were required to log in, open the website and complete the questionnaire in silence without looking at other people’s responses and they had to ensure that they answer every question. All they were required to do was read each statement carefully and then rate the statement by selecting an answer on the scale.
Results
The participants scores were measured using the CESD-r and the results were recorded and analysed.
The graph demonstrates that the non-student experienced more depressive symptoms in comparison to the students. The mean of the total CESD-r scores for the students was 15.7 (SD=11.4), however, for the non-student it was 17.5 (SD=14.8) which was slightly higher. We used an independent-samples t-test but we found the results to not be significant (t (279) =1.11, p=0.268). Henceforth, we accept the null hypothesis, there is no statistically significant difference in the CESD-r scores based on whether or not you are a student. The effect size was -0.143.
Discussion
The objective of conducting this study was so that we could investigate whether being a student or not can make you experience more depressive symptoms. The results denote that there was no relationship between being a student and the score they got on the questionnaire in fact the non-students suffered from depressive symptoms more. Therefore, we fail to reject the null hypothesis.
Our results are not supported by previous studies conducted in the past which suggest that mental health problems are highly prevalent among college students, according to several data sources. In the 2008 National College Health Assessment sponsored by the American College Health Association (ACHA-NCHA), more than one in three undergraduates reported “feeling so depressed it was difficult to function” at least once in the previous year, and nearly one in 10 reported “seriously considering attempting suicide” in the previous year (Hunt, J., & Eisenberg, D., 2010). On average, students’ scores were higher than for similar-aged adults in a national standardisation sample (Sharp, J., & Theiler, S. 2018)
However, some weakness in our study which could include the fact that it was conducted in a computer room full of other students which may have led to socially desirable answers and therefore could have impacted the results. If they felt as if people were watching them as they input their answers then this could have caused them to lie about the answers. Consequently, if the students completed that questionnaire independently then this may have increased the validity of the results and may have instead supported the alternative hypothesis.
Even though our results were not statistically significant, our study still illustrates that adolescents do suffer from depressive symptoms in general. Consequently, having support groups could help them manage their depressive symptoms. Also, the increase between first year and second year mean scores was significant (Macaskill, A., 2013) thus if we used students in different years this may have led to different results as there may be more pressure on second/third years leading to them experiencing more symptoms.
After examining the results, we can conclude that being a student does not make you more likely to experience depressive symptoms, but further research and replication could be done to corroborate the results.
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