A Longitudinal Investigation of Depressive Symptoms in Undergraduate Students of Pharmacy in Syria

Abstract

This prospective longitudinal study investigated depressive symptoms and its association with students' demographic, academic, and health factors in undergraduate students of pharmacy in Syria. Students attending any year (1st to 5th year) were assessed in the first semester (time 1) and in the second semester (time 2). An academic year comprises two semesters of 16 weeks each. Data for 450 students were analyzed at time 1, and 262 students were assessed at the two time points. Our results showed that most of the students experienced depressive symptoms, with a substantial percentage presenting moderate to severe levels of symptoms (35% or 450 students at time 1; 23% or 262 students at time 2). Across the two semesters, a significant decrease in depressive symptoms was observed for students with complete data at the two time points. Depressive symptoms at time 2 increased significantly with increasing depressive scores at time 1 and decreasing students' expectations about their academic performance. Our results support the clear need for dynamic, full-time, and accessible psychological services at the university to promote and assess mental health and to deliver psychological interventions to students at need.

The Predictors of Graduation: Social Skills, Mental Health, Academic Characteristics

“…This relation between mental health problems and academic performance was also verified in other comparative studies on different mental health problems (Castaño-Perez & Calderon-Vallejo, 2014;Gonçalves et. al., 2012;Hernández-Pozo et al, 2008).…”

“…In this scenario, other variables have been considered relevant to understand the academic performance, such as social skills (Aguilar, 2008;Artino et al, 2012;Fernandez, Salamonson, & Griffiths, 2012;Gomes & Soares, 2013;Ihm, Lee, Kim, Jang, & Jin, 2013;Oyarzún Iturra, Estrada Goic, Pino Astete, & Oyarzún Jara, 2012;Victoroff & Boyatzis, 2013); mental health conditions, such as anxiety (Costales & Neira, 2011;Hernández-Pozo, Coronado Álvarez, Araújo Contreras, & Cerezo Reséndiz, 2008), depression (Gonçalves, Zidan, Issa, & Barah, 2012;Turner, Thompson, Huber, & Arif, 2012) and drugs use (Bajwa et al, 2013;Castaño-Perez & Calderon-Vallejo, 2014); besides academic variables like knowledge areas (Garzella, 2013) and courses (Martí Ballester, 2012).…”

Prediction of course completion by students of a university in Brazil

“…The relationship between academic performance and school anxiety was approached by Hernández-Pozo et al (2008), with Mexican students, with it being found that those who had academic difficulties presented increased rates of depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and impoverished interpersonal relationships. Similarly, with Syrian university, Gonçalves et al (2012) found that the lower the academic performance at the end of the course, the higher the depression scores at the beginning of the course, and at the end of the course, with these scores increasing with decreasing expectations of academic performance. The authors emphasized that poor school performance can act as a factor that contributes to the development of depressive symptoms.…”

“…The associations can be bidirectional with respect to academic performance and mental health, with deficient academic performance negatively influencing mental health (Hernández-Pozo, Àlvarez, Contreras & Reséndiz, 2008;López-Bárcena, González-de Cossío, Ávila-Martínez & Teos-Aguilar., 2009), or with mental health problems interfering with academic performance (Gonçalves et al, 2012;Turner, Thompson, Huber & Arif, 2012).…”

“…It appears that academic experiences that do not guarantee good quality of life can influence academic performance (Hussain, Guppy, Robertson & Temple, 2013;Ramírez, Hernández & García-Campayo, 2009;Shamsuddin et al, 2013;Wristen, 2013) and mental health (Baptista et al, 2012;Bitsika & Sharpley, 2012;Fang et al, 2010;Gonçalves et al, 2012;Osada, Rojas, Rosales & Veja-Dienstmaier, 2010). Conversely, having good social interactions promotes mental health (Adlaf et al, 2001), and the social skills repertoire can help in facing challenges and problems, positively influencing the adaption to university (Monteiro et al, 2008), mental health (Bolsoni-Silva & Loureiro, 2015b) and academic performance (López-Barcena et al, 2009).…”