Social anxiety and eating disorders in medical students

Aim. Assessment of social anxiety and eating disorders prevalence in students of Voronezh State Medical University after N.N. Burdenko.

Methods. The study was conducted in 2020–2021 among students of Voronezh State Medical University on the basis of the Voronezh Regional Psychoneurological Dispensary and the “Lion-Med” clinic. Were used printed and online versions of the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale and the Dutch Eating Disorders Questionnaire (DEBQ). It was carried out correlation analysis of data between the general statistical indicators of the sample (gender, age, year of education) and the data of the questionnaires for each question separately. The correlation coefficient for nonparametric scale types (Pearson correlation coefficient) was used in the analysis.

Results. Overall, significant level of anxiety was in diagnosed 525 (45.09%) people. The average duration of anxiety symptoms was 1.5 years. High level of social anxiety was estimated in 14.57% (169 people), marked level was revealed in 5.28% (61 people), moderate level was diagnosed in 14.08% (163 people), low social anxiety level was diagnosed in 11.09% (132 people), 54.98% didn’t have any features of social anxiety (641 people). Restrictive and emotional types of eating disorders correlate with the female gender and the older year of education (p <0.01). There were no significant correlations between the gender of the respondents and the year of education in relation to the external type of eating disorder.

Conclusion. Attention is drawn, firstly, to the relatively high percentage of social anxiety among medical students, and secondly, to the presence of eating behaviors predisposing to eating disorders. Features of restrictive and emotional eating behavior correlate with the year of education (the older the course, the more often these types of eating patterns are revealed).