Loading…
Network analysis of depression and anxiety symptoms and their associations with mobile phone addiction among Chinese medical students during the late stage of the COVID-19 pandemic
Network analysis provides a novel approach to discovering associations between mental disorders at the symptom level. This study aimed to examine the characteristics of the network of depression and anxiety symptoms and their associations with mobile phone addiction (MPA) among Chinese medical stude...
Saved in:
Published in: | SSM - population health 2024-03, Vol.25, p.101567, Article 101567 |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
Format: | Article |
Language: | English |
Subjects: | |
Citations: | Items that this one cites Items that cite this one |
Online Access: | Get full text |
Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
Summary: | Network analysis provides a novel approach to discovering associations between mental disorders at the symptom level. This study aimed to examine the characteristics of the network of depression and anxiety symptoms and their associations with mobile phone addiction (MPA) among Chinese medical students during the late stage of the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 553 medical students were included. Depression and anxiety symptoms and MPA were measured by the nine-item Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), the seven-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7), and the Mobile Phone Addiction Index (MPAI), respectively. Central and bridge symptoms were identified with centrality indices and bridge centrality indices. Network stability was examined using the case-dropping procedure. “Uncontrollable worry”, “restlessness” and “nervousness” were the central symptoms in the depression and anxiety network. “Restlessness” and “motor” were the most central bridge symptoms linking depression and anxiety. “Concentration”, “anhedonia” and “sleep” were most strongly associated with MPA. “Uncontrollable worry”, “restlessness”, “nervousness,” and “motor” may be the symptoms for interventions to target in medical students with comorbid depression and anxiety. From a network perspective, depressive symptoms may be more important than anxiety symptoms in medical students with MPA.
•Network analysis provided novel insight into depression and anxiety.•“uncontrollable worry”, “restlessness” and “nervousness” were central symptoms.•“restlessness” and “motor” were bridge symptoms between depression and anxiety.•Depression symptoms were important than anxiety symptoms in mobile phone addiction. |
---|---|
ISSN: | 2352-8273 2352-8273 |
DOI: | 10.1016/j.ssmph.2023.101567 |