Prevalence of depressive symptoms and its correlations with positive psychological variables among Chinese medical students: an exploratory cross-sectional study

BackgroundKnowledge about the prevalence of depressive symptoms among Chinese medical students and its related factors is rather limited. Understanding the correlates of depressive symptoms and the roles that positive psychological variables play in depressive symptoms is of vital importance for future interventions. The main objectives of this study were to investigate the prevalence of depressive symptoms and the integrated effects of resilience, hope and optimism on depressive symptoms among Chinese medical students.MethodsThis multi-center cross-sectional study was conducted in June 2014. The questionnaires that consisted of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D), Wagnild and Young Resilience Scale-14 (RS-14), Adult Dispositional Hope Scale (ADHS), Life Orientation Test-Revised (LOT-R), and socio-demographic characteristics, were distributed to students at four medical colleges or universities in Liaoning province, China. A total of 2925 medical students became the final subjects. Hierarchical linear regression analyses were used to explore the integrated effects of resilience, hope and optimism on depressive symptoms.ResultsThe prevalence of depressive symptoms among Chinese medical students was 66.8 % (CES-D ≥ 16). Resilience, hope and optimism were all negatively correlated with depressive symptoms and they accounted for 26.1 % of the variance in depressive symptoms.ConclusionsThe high prevalence of depressive symptoms among Chinese medical students calls for special attention from all stakeholders, especially university authorities. Intervention strategies that focus on enhancing the positive psychological variables of resilience, hope and optimism can be integrated into depression prevention and treatment programs.

• Publication year

  2016

• Venue

  BMC Psychiatry

• Publication date

  2016-01-11

• Fields of study

  Medicine, Psychology

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1186/s12888-016-0710-3PMID 26754773PMCID 4707780
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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