Frequency of anxiety and its relation with depression and other individual ‎characteristics in nursing students

Introduction: Anxiety is among the most prevalent mental disorder which people in any society &lrm;may encounter. This vague and uncomfortable feeling may affect all aspects of one's life and also &lrm;can accompany unlimited number of disorders such as depression. &lrm; Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the frequency of anxiety in college students and &lrm;its relation with depression and other personal characteristics. &lrm; &nbsp;Methods: This is a descriptive co- relational study. The study population included all nursing &lrm;college students of Azad university of Lahijan and East Guilan Nursing &Midwifery Faculty from &lrm;which &lrm;&rlm;150&rlm;&lrm; students were randomly selected. Data collection instrument consisted of a &lrm;questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive and analytical statistics such as Chi-square and &lrm;Fisher's test by SPSS software. &lrm; Results: This study included &lrm;&rlm;121&rlm;&lrm; female and &lrm;&rlm;29&rlm;&lrm; male students. Results showed that &lrm;&rlm;%68&rlm;&lrm; of college &lrm;students were anxious and in regard to depression, &lrm;&rlm;52%&rlm;&lrm; showed no sign of depression. Results &lrm;showed significant relationship between anxiety and depression (p<&lrm;&rlm;0.05&rlm;&lrm;), also between anxiety and &lrm;depression and sex, marital status, satisfaction with major, positive attitude of family to major, well &lrm;fair and family history of depression (p<&lrm;&rlm;0.05&rlm;&lrm;). But there was no significant relationship between &lrm;anxiety and depression with age, place of living and living parents. &lrm; Conclusion: According to research results, it seems more focus must be on this population and &lrm;favorable condition should be provided for their success in education. Anxiety and depression can &lrm;influence college students&rsquo; functions in various aspects of personality and social life. &lrm;