The prevalence and social determinants of depression among high school students in Boukan City

Abstract

Depression is a common psychiatric disorder and is one of the four major diseases in the world and the most common cause of disability. The aim of this study is to estimate the the prevalence and social determinants of depression among high school students in Boukan City. Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional study and 453 students of 6000 high school students from Public schools in Bukan city in 2019, with informed consent were enrolled in the study. There were 17 public schools in the city, including 10 girls' high schools and 7 boys' high schools. A girls' high school and a boys' high school were selected by convenience (easy) sampling and the Beck's questionnaires were completed by students at all levels. The Beck's questionnaire consisted of two parts: 1) demographic characteristics and the amount of use of cyberspace and non-school physical activity and 2) measuring depression. Results: In this study, 453 samples of students with approximately equal gender frequency (50.1% of girls and 49.9% of boys) were studied. Most of these students' father and mother job were self-employment and housewives, respectively, and the highest levels of education in this parents were under the diploma with 345 (77.2%) and 413 (92.4%) persons, respectively. In this study, most of the physical activity in the students was less than 150 minutes per week with 268 cases (59.8%). Also, the use of cyberspace for most students was under 2 hours with 285 cases (63.5%). In this study, the prevalence of depression in the students was in 207 cases (45.7%) none or least degree, in 77 cases (17.0%) mild, in 114 cases (25.2%) moderate and in 55 cases (12.1%) severe degree of depression. There was no significant relationship between the degree of depression among the students and the variables of gender, level and field of study, father's job and students' physical activity (p>0.05). On the other hand, variables such as mother's job, parents' education level, and duration of cyberspace were significantly correlated with the degree of depression in students (p<0.05).