A Questionnaire Based Study to Evaluate the Prevalence of Mental Stress among Undergraduates in an Engineering College in South Gujarat, India

Background: In the last few years, there has been an increase in mental stress and consequently mental illness and suicide rates worldwide. Young adults entering college are one of the most vulnerable population due to the major transition from teenage to adulthood. This study evaluates the prevalence of mental stress among the engineering college students. Materials and methods: This was a cross-sectional, questionnaire-based survey conducted in an engineering college after obtaining approval from the institutional ethical board and the Dean of the college. The questionnaire was distributed online via Google form links using a non-probability sampling approach. The questionnaire contained two parts – first part contained questions regarding the demographic details of the students and the second part contained ten multiple-choice questions to assess the mental health of students. The questions were inspired from the questionnaires available online from previous studies on similar topics as well as by patient health questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) which is used for screening and diagnosing individuals with anxiety, stress and depression. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze and report results. Results: A total of 246 completely filled questionnaires were evaluated. The age range of study population was from 17 to 26 years with mean age being 20.85 ± 3.16 years. 61.79% were male. Approximately half of the study population showed some symptoms of mental stress and depression such as little interest in doing things, difficulty sleeping or concentrating, change in eating habits and being fidgety or slow. 48.78% students felt bad about themselves and 19.51% had thoughts of self-harm several days a week. Majority of the students believed that mental health awareness programs will be beneficial for their psychological well-being. Conclusion: The prevalence of stress among the engineering college students was quite high. Various measures such as awareness, counseling, and mentorship program, as well as reducing their academic burden may help them to cope with stress in a better way.