Abstract
IntroductionTest anxiety and depression are of the major challenges experienced in students' life, considering the inverse associations they have on their mental wellbeing and academic performance. Evidence from Sudan have reported high figures of adolescent's mental health problems of depression and anxiety. However, studies investigating its association with academic exam stress are lacking. We investigated the prevalence of exam anxiety and depression severity among student setting for Sudan national boarding examination, aiming at identifying possible predictors related to student's socio-demographic and academic status and measuring correlation between exam anxiety and depression severity status among students.MethodsUsing cross-sectional design, data obtained using standardized west side anxiety scale for measuring test anxiety; and patient's health questionnaire (PHQ9) of nine items for measuring depression was presented in percentages. Association with sociodemographic and academic factors was measured using logistic regression models. Analysis was run at 0.05 level of significance.ResultsDepression and exam anxiety were found to be highly correlated. The highest fractions of students are those with high levels of test anxiety and moderate to severe depression. Gender, maternal level of education, previous exam experience and academic performance are significant predictor for student's exam anxiety status.ConclusionHigh figures of exam anxiety and depression are there among Sudanese students setting for their third years boarding exam. Males, low academic performance and maternal low education are risk factors. School mental health services and programs addressing such group of students are highly demanded in line with more elaborative research efforts in this arena.
Highlights
Of late, the psychological impact of the educational process on adolescent's life has become a topic of raising attention
Many studies and academic platforms inrelevant contexts have promoted such theory [29], in an interesting incorporate with our finding in this study that revealed low academic performance association with higher exam anxiety and depression.In this context, it could be possible that males pay less effort to academic preparation compared to females; the thing which is causing them higher exam anxiety levels, especially that this assumption is strongly supported by the fact that over the last 20 years, female students tends to acquire more position in the top scoring students in Sudan boarding exams
We investigated the predictors, correlations and levels of exam anxiety and depression among third year's students sitting for Sudan national secondary boarding exam in Sudan.We found a high level of both exam anxiety and depression that are highly correlated with each other among students .Male gender, exam setting experiences, academic performance and maternal educational level were significant predictors of exam anxietystatus, in contrast to students age and paternal educational level
Summary
The psychological impact of the educational process on adolescent's life has become a topic of raising attention. Test anxiety and depression are one of the major challenges experienced by students, considering the inverse associations they have onstudent's mental well-being and academic performance [1,2,3]. Examinations stress and school work is considered one of the major stress causes in adolescents life,especially when they act as an obstacle in face of their future aspirations [4]. Consequences of exam anxiety might affect both students' academic performance or physiological and psychological well-being: students who suffer anxiety could have impaired reasoning abilities, working memories and self-esteem. They might experience psycho-somatic characteristics like palpitation, sweating palms, fast breath, panic attacks and stomach upset [8]. Test anxiety among adolescent students was proven to manifest in associative model with mental and behavioral comorbidities like depression, substance abuse, conduct disorders and intentions to violence and more extremely tendency to commit suicide [9,10,11]
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