Global prevalence and trend of anxiety among graduate students: A systematic review and meta‐analysis

Abstract

Objective To evaluate the comprehensive prevalence of anxiety among postgraduates and estimate its changes with a meta‐analysis. Method Systematic retrieval to SAGE, ERIC, EBSCO, Wiley, ScienceDirect, ProQuest, PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science database was performed for quantitative studies on the prevalence of anxiety among graduate students published before November 22, 2022. The prevalence of anxiety synthesized with random‐effects model, and subgroup analysis was conducted by study characteristics (publication year, sampling method, and measurements) and subjects’ characteristics (gender, region, and educational level). Result Fifty studies were included in the meta‐analysis, totaling 39,668 graduate students. The result revealed that 34.8% of graduates suffered from the anxiety (95% CI: 29.5%–40.5%). Specifically, 19.1% (95% CI: 15.4%–23.5%) had mild anxiety, 15.1% (95% C: 11.6%–19.6%) had moderate anxiety, and 10.3% (95% CI: 7.2%–14.6%) had severe anxiety. And this prevalence showed a upward trend since 2005. Besides, master students suffered slightly less than doctoral students (29.2% vs. 34.3%), and female had similar anxiety to male (26.4% vs. 24.9%). Due to the COVID‐19, the prevalence of anxiety is higher after the pandemic than that before (any anxiety: 34.3% vs. 24.8%). Compared with other countries, students from Saudi Arabia, India, and Nepal were more vulnerable. The results of quality assessment showed that, 5 (10%) were in high quality, 21 (42%) were in moderate to high quality, 21 (42%) were in low to moderate quality, and 3 (6%) were in low quality. But, the studies with low quality tend to report a higher prevalence than that with high quality (40.3% vs. 13.0%), studies with nonrandom sampling tend to report a higher prevalence than that with random sampling (33.6% vs. 20.7%). Although we included the data collected based on the standard scales, there were higher heterogeneity among the measure ( Q = 253.1, df = 12, p < .00). Conclusion More than one‐third postgraduates suffered from anxiety disorder, and this prevalence had a slight upward trend since 2005, school administrators, teachers and students should take joint actions to prevent mental disorder of graduates for deteriorating.

Analysis of the situations and influencing factors of public anxiety in China: based on Baidu index data

“…Furthermore, our calculations demonstrate that graduates exert a more significant influence on the ABDI. This emphasizes that university graduates have become the primary demographic group experiencing public anxiety, which aligns with findings presented in other studies ( 45 , 46 ).…”

Anxiety among Faculty Members of Academic Institutions of a Metropolitan City: A Descriptive Cross-sectional Study

“…11 A review study done on the global prevalence and trend of anxiety among graduate students also showed that 34.8% of graduates suffered from anxiety. 12 However, a study conducted among the adult population in Nepal shows a lower prevalence of anxiety which was 16.1%. 3 Among those who had anxiety, the proportion of males was higher than the proportion of females in the study.…”

Suicide among national university graduate students in Japan from 2002 to 2021

“…Academic posts did not follow this augmentation and, at present, a shortage of academic posts is prevalent globally. This causes job search difficulty following the completion of studies even for those students forced to neglect their personal lives due to the tremendous amount of research work 2,18 . Risks for suicide may await after doctoral studies.…”

“…Graduate students are exposed to various types of stress and are thus prone to mental health problems 1 . For example, a systematic review revealed that 34.8% of graduate students from 12 countries suffered from anxiety disorder 2 . The American College Health Association National College Health Assessment found that graduate students have a slightly higher rate of suicidal ideation (12.7%) than undergraduates (12.0%), although rates of depression and anxiety among graduates are slightly lower than those among undergraduates (14.8% vs. 17.3% and 19.5% vs. 22.8%, respectively) 3 .…”