Open AccessA Comparison of Depressive Symptoms in Medical and Psychology Students in Germany – Associations with Potential Risk and Resilience Factors
Author(s) -
Tordis Kindt,
Nadja Rabkow,
Lilith Pukas,
Lea Keuch,
Alexandra Sapalidis,
Anna Piloty-Leskien,
Jonas Röhler,
René T. Proyer,
Stefan Watzke
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
journal of medical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2468-3892
pISSN - 2468-3884
DOI - 10.3233/jmp-200023
Subject(s) - neuroticism , clinical psychology , psychological resilience , psychology , mental health , context (archaeology) , depression (economics) , medical psychology , depressive symptoms , beck depression inventory , psychiatry , personality , medline , psychotherapist , anxiety , social psychology , paleontology , macroeconomics , political science , law , economics , biology
Background: Previous studies have shown that medical students are more prone to suffer from symptoms related to depression than other students. Even though there is some evidence that psychology students also experience such symptoms, research concerning the mental health of future psychologists is scarce. Objective: The aims of this study were threefold: (a) to determine the prevalence of symptoms related to depression among medical and psychology students (b) to investigate risk factors, which may have a potential influence on the development of depressive symptoms and (c) to examine resilience factors in order to indicate possible approaches to improve the mental health of the students. Methods: A total of 673 medical and psychology students completed the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) to assess depressive symptoms, a neuroticism scale, and a standardized questionnaire for 13 risk and eight resilience factors derived from the literature. Results: While the results of previous research concerning the prevalence of depressive symptoms could be replicated for medical students (22% exceeding the cut-off in the BDI-II), psychology students demonstrated an even higher prevalence (28%). Ten potential risk factors and five potential resilience factors could be identified, which also showed a cumulative effect: The more risk factors students reported, the more depressive symptoms they experienced; the inverse effect was observed for resilience factors. Conclusions: Not only medical but also psychology students show elevated depressive symptomatology. In the university context, notably, the pressure to perform represents a potential risk factor, whereas the presence of just two resilience factors such as emotional support and study satisfaction contribute to a decrease of symptoms.