Anxiety and depressive symptoms in college students during the late stage of the COVID-19 outbreak: a network approach

Bai, Wei; Cai, Hong; Liu, Shou; Xu, Chen; Sha, Sha; Cheung, Teris; Lin, J.; Cui, Xiling; Ng, Chee H.; Xiang, Yu‐Tao

doi:10.1038/s41398-021-01738-4

Cited by 44 publications

(54 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…This likely has to do with a sedentary lifestyle, lack of physical activity and poor sleep quality. Anxiety symptoms such as uncontrollable worry and trouble relaxing have also high expected in uence, which was agreement with former studies for college students [41]. The lives of people have become rife with anxious mood from life stress, work rhythm, interpersonal relationship and social problems in today's fast-paced society.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

“…We rst examined interrelation between depression and anxiety symptoms of a general population. In the entire comorbid network of depression-anxiety symptoms, most of the strongest edges lay in depressive community, which is in line with former researches [39,40], whereas study conducted by Bai et al using a college students population drew different conclusions [41]. The disparity might results from different sampling and population.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 82%

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Bridge connection between depression and anxiety symptoms and lifestyles in Chinese residents from a network perspective

Wang

Gao³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Purpose As lifestyle behaviors are components of the culture of mental health treatment settings, we examined bridge connection between depression and anxiety symptoms and lifestyles from a network perspective using a population-based study.Methods A provincial representative sample of 13,768 inhabitants from the Guangdong Sleep and Psychosomatic Health Survey was face-to-face interviewed using standardized assessment tools. Expected influence was used to identify central symptoms. The interconnection between depression and anxiety symptoms, and bridge connectivity linking depression-anxiety symptoms and lifestyle factors was evaluated using bridge centrality index. A case dropping bootstrap procedure was employed to network stability and sensibility analyses. Results In depression-anxiety symptoms network,fatigue or little energy has the highest expected influence, followed by uncontrollable worry, trouble relaxing and sad mood. Surrounding nodes of each node explained a mean 57.63% of the variance. In the network integrating depression-anxiety symptoms with lifestyle factors, suicidal thoughts were identified as collective bridging symptoms connecting lifestyle variables. And irritability and guilt also indicated the highest connectivity with lifestyles. All networks had high stability and accuracy. Conclusion These emphasized core and bridge symptoms were latent targets to prevent and intervene comorbid depression and anxiety. Targeting interventions aiming at specific lifestyle behaviors may be crucial to develop efficient and purposeful treatment strategies for clinical practitioners.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 82%

Bridge connection between depression and anxiety symptoms and lifestyles in Chinese residents from a network perspective

Wang

Gao³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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“…The COVID-19 outbreak has contributed to severe medical and mental health issues, particularly in vulnerable groups ( e.g. , students and individuals with preexisting mental health problems)[ 4 ], with devastating morbidity and mortality[ 5 , 6 ]. Emotional disorders ( e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Application of unified protocol as a transdiagnostic treatment for emotional disorders during COVID-19: An internet-delivered randomized controlled trial

Kou¹,

Yusufi²,

Nazari³

2022

WJCC

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BACKGROUND The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been an emotionally challenging time, especially for young adults. It is associated with a substantial increase in the prevalence of mental health problems, negative symptoms, and stressful experiences that compromise well-being. In low-income countries, internet-delivered psychological services could have a remarkable impact on the population’s mental health, given the lack of mental health professionals. AIM To investigate the efficacy of internet-delivered cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT)-transdiagnostic intervention for adults with emotional disorders. METHODS In this internet-delivered randomized controlled trial, 102 students with an emotional disorder (mean age = 28.20 years, standard deviation = 5.07) were randomly allocated to receive unified protocol (UP) ( n = 51) or treatment as the usual intervention. Following a semi-structured clinical interview, participants completed an online survey including the Overall Anxiety Severity and Impairment Scale, Overall Depression Severity and Impairment Scale, Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule, and Emotional Style Questionnaire. RESULTS The participants showed a high degree of adherence. In total, 78% ( n = 40) of the experimental group participants completed the UP treatment. Considering the intention to treat procedure, the results of the analysis of covariance indicated that participants who received UP showed statistically significant changes in depression symptoms [Cohen’s d = -1.50 with 95% confidence interval (CI): -1.90 to -1.10], anxiety (Cohen’s d = -1.06 with 95%CI: -1.48 to -0.65), difficulties with emotion regulation (Cohen’s d = -0.33 with 95%CI: -0.7 to -0.06), positive affect (Cohen's d = 1.27 with 95%CI: 0.85 to 1.68), negative affect (Cohen’s d = -1.04 with 95%CI: -1.46 to -0.63), and healthy emotionality (Cohen’s d = 0.53 with 95%CI: 0.09 to 0.13) compared with the control group. CONCLUSION This study’s findings highlight the potential value of transdiagnostic internet-delivered programs for young adults with an emotional disorder during the COVID-19 pandemic, and expand the research examining emotional well-being improvements resulting from CBT-transdiagnostic interventions. The findings suggest that UP, which generally concentrates on reducing negative effects, can increase positive effects.

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“…In general, most previous researches on depression had always taken depression measures as a whole and computed composite scores to determine whether or not a person is depressed and how severe their depression is ( 22 , 23 ). However, it fails to uncover substantial connections between particular symptoms that may be more relevant for the emergence or maintenance of co-morbid experiences like depression ( 24 , 25 ). Network models can make up for this deficiency to some extent by using a web of interacting symptoms to map specific relationships between individual symptoms of a disease ( 26 , 27 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Network models can make up for this deficiency to some extent by using a web of interacting symptoms to map specific relationships between individual symptoms of a disease ( 26 , 27 ). Network analysis has been extensively employed in psychopathology in recent years to understand and display patterns associated with mental diseases ( 24 , 27 , 28 ). In network theory, core symptoms are more likely to trigger other symptoms, and so are believed to have a significant role in initiating the start and/or maintenance of the illness ( 29 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The association between family relationships and depressive symptoms among pregnant women: A network analysis

et al. 2022

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BackgroundDepression of pregnant women has been a growing concern in recent years, and previous research has found that family relationships are strongly associated with depression. From a network perspective, family relationships and depression can be conceptualized as the result of interactions between individual symptoms. This research approach can elucidate the structure and mechanisms of the relationship between individual symptoms within the two groups.MethodsA total of 990 participants were recruited from the obstetrics outpatient clinic of Maternal and Child Health Hospital in Huai'an through a randomized whole-group sampling. Respondents' depressive symptoms and family relationships were self-reported using questionnaire, and the structure of the family relationship-depressive symptoms network and related centrality indicators were examined for this sample.ResultsThe results of the network analysis suggested that the most influential symptoms in the network of family relationship-depressive symptoms were worry, feeling worthless, equal status with husband and couple relationship. And equal status with husband was the most prominent bridging symptoms in this study. The whole network was robust in both stability and accuracy tests.LimitationsInformation was obtained from subjects' self-reports, which may be subject to information bias. As a cross-sectional study, no causal link between family relationships and depressive symptoms can be established.ConclusionWorry, feeling worthless, equal status with husband and couple relationship are central symptoms of the family relationship-depressive symptoms network structure in pregnant women. Timely and systematic multilevel interventions targeting the central symptoms may be effective in alleviating the onset of depressive symptoms in women during this period.

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Anxiety and depressive symptoms in college students during the late stage of the COVID-19 outbreak: a network approach

Cited by 44 publications

References 47 publications

Bridge connection between depression and anxiety symptoms and lifestyles in Chinese residents from a network perspective

Bridge connection between depression and anxiety symptoms and lifestyles in Chinese residents from a network perspective

Application of unified protocol as a transdiagnostic treatment for emotional disorders during COVID-19: An internet-delivered randomized controlled trial

The association between family relationships and depressive symptoms among pregnant women: A network analysis

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