Effects of Depression on Students' Academic Performance

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the impact of depression on the academic outcomes of university-going students. For this purpose, a questionnaire called the “Depression Screening Test” based on a five-point Likert scale developed by Ivan Goldberg in 1993 was adopted. Academic performance was measured using the students' cumulative grade point average (CGPA). A sample of 101 respondents has been collected via purposive sampling technique. Changes in depression explain 37.8 per cent of changes in the students’ performance, which is significant at a 1 per cent level of significance. Moreover, the regression analysis depicts that a unit change in depression has an adverse impact of 0.426 units change in the CGPA, which is significant at a 1 per cent significance level. It is recommended that universities must have a psychologist on board who facilitates the students to dilute the depression.