Priyadarshni Rangarajan, Shaik F Sultana, Kurian Punnoose, Hina Ahmed, Gautam Singh, V Kiruthika, Suresh J Babu, C Swarnalatha, Abhishek Singh Nayyar
{"title":"Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health status among general masses: An in-deep analysis of the worst \"hitters\" of COVID-19 pandemic.","authors":"Priyadarshni Rangarajan, Shaik F Sultana, Kurian Punnoose, Hina Ahmed, Gautam Singh, V Kiruthika, Suresh J Babu, C Swarnalatha, Abhishek Singh Nayyar","doi":"10.4103/jehp.jehp_1389_23","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>A plethora of studies have reported the adverse psychiatric outcomes among the general masses during the COVID-19 pandemic; however, not much data is available in relation to the Indian population from this perspective. The aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health status among the general masses in the Indian population.</p><p><strong>Materials and methods: </strong>The present study was planned in a cross-sectional study design between July 2020 and October 2021 in which a well-structured questionnaire, consisting of questions assessing the sociodemographic profile, while, also, specific questions related to the stress and anxiety-related variables, was used. The questionnaire was validated through intra-class correlation with a strong correlation of 0.84. The Chi-square test was used for statistical analysis to test the association between the studied variables, while <i>P</i> < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>On comparison between the male and female participants using stress and anxiety-related variables, 43.81% of males as against 56.19% of the female participants reported that they felt horrified due to the pandemic with the results being statistically highly significant (<i>P</i> = 0.0043). Similarly, 45.18% of male and 54.82% of female participants expressed apprehension due to the fear of the pandemic with the results being statistically significant (<i>P</i> = 0.0217).</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>The research findings of the present study indicated that men and women responded to stress differently, with women experiencing greater sadness and anxiety and were found to be at a relatively greater risk for developing anxiety and depression than men.</p>","PeriodicalId":15581,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Education and Health Promotion","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.4000,"publicationDate":"2024-07-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11414858/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Education and Health Promotion","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.4103/jehp.jehp_1389_23","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"2024/1/1 0:00:00","PubModel":"eCollection","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"EDUCATION, SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Background: A plethora of studies have reported the adverse psychiatric outcomes among the general masses during the COVID-19 pandemic; however, not much data is available in relation to the Indian population from this perspective. The aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health status among the general masses in the Indian population.
Materials and methods: The present study was planned in a cross-sectional study design between July 2020 and October 2021 in which a well-structured questionnaire, consisting of questions assessing the sociodemographic profile, while, also, specific questions related to the stress and anxiety-related variables, was used. The questionnaire was validated through intra-class correlation with a strong correlation of 0.84. The Chi-square test was used for statistical analysis to test the association between the studied variables, while P < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results: On comparison between the male and female participants using stress and anxiety-related variables, 43.81% of males as against 56.19% of the female participants reported that they felt horrified due to the pandemic with the results being statistically highly significant (P = 0.0043). Similarly, 45.18% of male and 54.82% of female participants expressed apprehension due to the fear of the pandemic with the results being statistically significant (P = 0.0217).
Conclusion: The research findings of the present study indicated that men and women responded to stress differently, with women experiencing greater sadness and anxiety and were found to be at a relatively greater risk for developing anxiety and depression than men.