Background: University students are the developers of their nations' future and make up a significant number of young people. The number of students is increasing as universities and higher education centers develop. Hence, paying attention to student's physical and mental health is among the most important issues. The aim of the present analytical cross-sectional study was to determine the epidemiological pattern of loneliness and related factors among Maragheh University of Medical Sciences students.

Background and Aim: Given the dramatic decline in the ability of test due to test anxiety, the goal of this study was to evaluate the relationship between test anxiety and academic performances in students. Materials and Methods: This descriptive-analytical study was performed on 216 Iranian nursing and midwifery students in 2011-2012, utilizing Sarason Anxiety Inventory, demographic checklist and the average mark of students in the period of midterm and final exam. Multinomial logistic regression analyses by reporting odds ratios and their 95% confidence intervals were performed by SPSS17 software to assess the relationship between test anxiety and academic performances. Results: Mild, moderate and sever test anxiety was observed in 30.6, 43.1 and 26.4 percent of students respectively. Test anxiety was significantly related to academic performance (average), major and city. Also, there was 52.9% decrease for odds of having sever anxiety (compared to mild anxiety) with 1 point increase in average (OR = 0.471, 95% CI = (0.298-0.745) and p = 0.001). Conclusions: Due to inverse relationship between test anxiety and academic performance, performing preventive programs such as in time treatment of anxiety, empowering the students to deal with anxiety and conducting consulting services for how to studying are very important. Consequently it would be a big step in decreasing the test anxiety and therefore in improving the academic performance.

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