Stress Among Postgraduate Students And Its Association With Substance Use In Jimma University, South West Ethiopia

Abstract

Background: In today’s ultra-competitive environment, students face more stress than ever, be it related to studying, examinations, or peer, teacher or parental pressure. They face multiple stressors such as academic overload, constant pressure to succeed, competition with peers and financial burden as well as concerns about the future. However, its magnitude and association with substance use in postgraduate students is not indicated well in Ethiopia. Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess prevalence of stress among postgraduate students and its association with substance use. Methods: A cross-sectional study design was conducted on a sample of 360 postgraduate students at Jimma University. The study participants were selected by using Computer generated simple random sampling method after stratification and proportionally allocated into colleges. The data were collected by using self-administered structured questionnaires which contain sociodemographic characteristics, the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12), Postgraduate Stressor Questionnaire (PSQ-28), and Substance use questionnaire. Data were entered using Epi-Data Version 3.1 and analyzed using SPSS Version 20.0 for Windows. Descriptive statistics, bivariate analysis and multivariable logistic regression analysis were applied and statistically significance was declared at p-value < 0.05. Result: Majority of the respondents 256(74.0%) were males and the mean age of the respondents was 29.34 (SD = 4.7) years. The current prevalence of stress was 46.2% [95% CI 40.75%-51.25%]. Academic Related Stressor domain was the main source of stress 184(53.2%) among postgraduate students. Stress was significantly associated with female sex [AOR=1.90,95% CI(1.12-3.22)], single marital status [AOR=1.74,95%CI(1.09-2.77)], khat chewing[AOR=1.99,95%CI(1.09-3.64)], and cigarette smoking[AOR=2.10,95%CI(1.07-4.38)]. Whereas, alcohol drinking [AOR=0.44, 95% CI, (0.25-0.77)] has protective role for stress. Conclusion: The overall prevalence of stress among postgraduate students was found to be high. Being female in sex, unmarried students, students of College of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, khat chewing, and cigarette smoking were factors associated with stress. Whereas, alcohol drinking has protective role from stress in this study. It is recommended that stress needs due attention and remedial action from different concerned bodies on the adverse effect of substance use, academic counseling and stress reduction interventions.