Psychological Distress and Life Satisfaction among University Students

Abstract

The sample of the present research consisted of 398 university students of final year from three faculties (Medical sciences, Social science and Engineering). Materials Demographic information form Demographic information form included participant's age, gender, education, family structure and socio-economic status. The Depression anxiety stress scale [12] The Depression anxiety stress scale (DASS) is a 21-item (short version) self-reported inventory that evaluates negative affective states. It has three sub-scales depression, anxiety and stress; each contains 7 items. Scores of each sub-scale is obtained by summing the score of relevant items. The depression scale measures low mood, negative thoughts and low self esteem. The anxiety scale measures anxious feelings, restlessness and stress scale assess reaction to stressful situations, negative feelings and impatient. The respondent is required to use four point scale where 0 (does not apply) to 3 (always/almost applies) to indicate their level of agreement with item they experienced in past week. DASS has found to a validate scale and have demonstrated good internal consistency of the DASS scales in both the 42-and 21-item (DASS-21) versions: Depression (range =.91 to .97); Anxiety (range =.81 to .92); and Stress (range =.88 to .95). The Satisfaction with life scale [13] This scale consists of 5 items, answered using a 1-7 scale, where 1 = did not apply to me at all, and 7 = applied to me very much or most of the time (range of possible scores is 5-35). Higher scores indicate higher levels of life satisfaction. Procedure The sample of the present research consisted of 398 university students of final year from three faculties (Medical sciences, Social science and Engineering). Data collected from different Universities (Baqai medical University, Sir Syed Engineering University and University of Karachi) following the purposive sampling technique. For the collection of data formal permission has been taken from the concerned authorities of origination and briefly explained the purpose of the research. Secondly the participants were told about the ethics of research; informed consent, their voluntarily participation, the matter of confidentiality and right to withdraw from the study. The participants first completed the Demographic Information then the depression Anxiety stress scale [12] and The Satisfaction with Life Scale [13]. Responses were scored according to the producer given in manuals. At the end of data collection they were thanked for their cooperation.