Personality Traits, Stress, Anxiety, Depression Levels, Fear of Childbirth, and Affecting Factors in Turkish University Students

TL;DR

This study explores how personality traits and mental health factors like stress and anxiety relate to fear of childbirth in Turkish university students.

Contribution

The study identifies negative affectivity as a key predictor of fear of childbirth in female university students.

Findings

Fear of childbirth was positively correlated with stress, anxiety, depression, and negative affectivity.

Negative affectivity was the strongest predictor of fear of childbirth prior to pregnancy.

Over half of the participants were from the Faculty of Health Sciences, with notable mental health score ranges.

Abstract

Objectives: This study was conducted to investigate the personality traits, stress, anxiety, depression levels, fear of childbirth, and affecting factors in Turkish female university students.

Materials and Methods: The study was planned as a descriptive and correlational type. The sample consisted of 500 female students who met the research criteria at the Faculty of Health Sciences and Faculty of Education of a university. The data were collected face-to-face using a personal information form, including socio-demographic and pregnancy-birth-related thoughts, the Childbirth Fear–Prior to Pregnancy (CFPP) scale, the Type D Personality Scale (negative affectivity and social inhibition subscales), and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21). Ethics committee approval and institutional permissions were obtained from the students to conduct the study. In the analysis of the data, the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test, descriptive methods Mann–Whitney U, and the Kruskal–Wallis test were used.

Results: 52.8% of the students were from the Faculty of Health Sciences, 48.4% were nursing students, and 30.6% were in their first class of students. The mean CFPP score was 40.14 ± 11.35. The mean score was 12.01 ± 6.79 for negative affectivity, 9.58 ± 6.09 for social inhibition, 6.75 ± 4.05 for stress, 5.28 ± 4.09 for anxiety, and 5.58 ± 4.50 for depression. There was a low level of positive correlation between CFPP and social inhibition subscales (r = 0.113), negative affectivity (r = 0.282), stress (r = 0.241), anxiety (r = 0.231), and depression (r = 0.221 (p = 0.01). The predictor of students' fear of childbirth prior to pregnancy was negative affectivity.

Conclusions: Turkish university students' fear of childbirth prior to pregnancy was associated with personality traits, depression, anxiety, and stress. It is recommended to identify the depression, anxiety, stress levels, personality traits, and fear of childbirth of female university students in the prepregnancy period, plan information and education, and conduct further research on the fear of childbirth.

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