Perceived sources of stress in the dental school environment.

The purpose of this study was to identify the perceived stress of dental students across the entire curriculum (D1-D4 years). The dental environmental stress (DES) questionnaire was administered to 244 (90.4 percent) dental students during 1990. Significant differences were found for 12 questionnaire items across four classes. For male-female comparisons, significant differences were found for 17 questionnaire items, all perceived as more stressful by females; and between classes, significant differences were accounted for by three questionnaire items. Comparisons with previous dental students (1980s) on the identical questionnaire were noted.