Section of Hygiene, University Department of Life Sciences and Public Health -Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Rome, Italy.
Department of Woman and Child Health and Public Health - Public Health Area, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS, Rome, Italy.
Global Health. 2021 Apr 6;17(1):39. doi: 10.1186/s12992-021-00680-w.
Italy was the first European country to implement a national lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Worldwide, this pandemic had a huge impact on the mental health of people in many countries causing similar reaction in terms of emotions and concerns at the population level. Our study investigated the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on psychological well-being in a cohort of Italian university students.
We conducted a cross-sectional survey in the period immediately after the first lockdown through the administration of a questionnaire on the personal websites of students attending their undergraduate courses at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. We used the Patient-Health-Engagement-Scale, Self-Rating-Anxiety-Scale, and Self-Rating-Depression-Scale to assess engagement, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms of our sample.
The sample size was 501 subjects, of which 35.33% were classified as anxious and 72.93% as depressed. Over 90% of respondents had good understanding of the preventive measures despite over 70% suffered from the impossibility of physically seeing friends and partners. Around 55% of students would have been willing to contribute much more to face the pandemic. An increase in the occurrences of anxiety was associated with being female, being student of the Rome campus, suffering from the impossibility of attending university, being distant from colleagues, and being unable of physically seeing one's partner. Performing physical activity reduced this likelihood.
University students are at risk of psychological distress in the case of traumatic events. The evolution of the pandemic is uncertain and may have long-term effects on mental health. Therefore, it is crucial to study the most effective interventions to identify vulnerable subgroups and to plan for acute and long-term psychological services to control and reduce the burden of psychological problems.
意大利是第一个因 COVID-19 大流行而实施全国封锁的欧洲国家。在全球范围内，这场大流行对许多国家的民众心理健康产生了巨大影响，在人群层面上引起了类似的情绪和担忧反应。我们的研究调查了 COVID-19 大流行对意大利大学生群体心理健康的影响。
我们在首次封锁后立即通过在学生参加本科课程的 Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore 的个人网站上管理问卷进行了横断面调查。我们使用患者健康参与量表、自评焦虑量表和自评抑郁量表来评估我们样本的参与度、焦虑症状和抑郁症状。
样本量为 501 名受试者，其中 35.33%被归类为焦虑，72.93%为抑郁。尽管超过 70%的人无法亲自见到朋友和伴侣，但超过 90%的受访者对预防措施有很好的理解。大约 55%的学生愿意更多地为应对大流行做出贡献。焦虑发生率的增加与女性、罗马校区的学生、无法上大学、与同事疏远以及无法与伴侣见面有关。进行体育锻炼会降低这种可能性。
在创伤性事件中，大学生有心理困扰的风险。大流行的发展是不确定的，可能对心理健康产生长期影响。因此，研究最有效的干预措施以确定弱势群体并计划急性和长期心理服务以控制和减轻心理问题负担至关重要。
