Prevalence and socio-demographic correlates of psychological health problems in Chinese adolescents during the outbreak of COVID-19

Psychological health problems, especially emotional disorders, are common among adolescents. The epidemiology of emotional disorders is greatly influenced by stressful events. This study sought to assess the prevalence rate and socio-demographic correlates of depressive and anxiety symptoms among Ch...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	European child & adolescent psychiatry 2020-06, Vol.29 (6), p.749-758
Main Authors:	Zhou, Shuang-Jiang, Zhang, Li-Gang, Wang, Lei-Lei, Guo, Zhao-Chang, Wang, Jing-Qi, Chen, Jin-Cheng, Liu, Mei, Chen, Xi, Chen, Jing-Xu
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Adolescent Adolescents Anxiety Anxiety - epidemiology Anxiety - psychology Anxiety disorders Betacoronavirus Child Child & adolescent psychiatry Child and Adolescent Psychiatry China - epidemiology Conduct disorder Coronavirus Infections - epidemiology Coronavirus Infections - psychology Coronaviruses COVID-19 Cross-Sectional Studies Demography Depression - epidemiology Depression - psychology Disease Outbreaks Emotional disorders Emotions Epidemics Epidemiology Female Gender Generalized anxiety disorder Health problems Humans Internet Male Medicine Medicine & Public Health Mental depression Mental Health Original Contribution Outbreaks Pandemics Pneumonia, Viral - epidemiology Pneumonia, Viral - psychology Polls & surveys Prevalence Psychiatry Psychological well being Questionnaires Regression analysis Risk Factors SARS-CoV-2 Secondary schools Sociodemographics Stressful events Students Students - psychology Students - statistics & numerical data Surveys and Questionnaires Symptoms Teenagers
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Summary:	Psychological health problems, especially emotional disorders, are common among adolescents. The epidemiology of emotional disorders is greatly influenced by stressful events. This study sought to assess the prevalence rate and socio-demographic correlates of depressive and anxiety symptoms among Chinese adolescents affected by the outbreak of COVID-19. We conducted a cross-sectional study among Chinese students aged 12–18 years during the COVID-19 epidemic period. An online survey was used to conduct rapid assessment. A total of 8079 participants were involved in the study. An online survey was used to collect demographic data, assess students’ awareness of COVID-19, and assess depressive and anxiety symptoms with the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) and the Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) questionnaire, respectively. The prevalence of depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and a combination of depressive and anxiety symptoms was 43.7%, 37.4%, and 31.3%, respectively, among Chinese high school students during the COVID-19 outbreak. Multivariable logistic regression analysis revealed that female gender was the higher risk factor for depressive and anxiety symptoms. In terms of grades, senior high school was a risk factor for depressive and anxiety symptoms; the higher the grade, the greater the prevalence of depressive and anxiety symptoms. Our findings show there is a high prevalence of psychological health problems among adolescents, which are negatively associated with the level of awareness of COVID-19. These findings suggest that the government needs to pay more attention to psychological health among adolescents while combating COVID-19.
ISSN:	1018-8827 1435-165X