Studying the Relationship between University Students' Anxiety and Depression with Religious Orientation, Quality of Sleep and Emotional Cognitive Adjustment

Abstract

Several studies have shown that mental health is positively associated with religious orientation, cognitive-emotional regulation and sleep quality. Therefore, the present study was conducted to investigate the relationship between university students' anxiety and depression with religious orientation, quality of sleep and their emotional cognitive adjustment. The statistical population of this study included all students of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences. A total number of 235 students participated in the study. The psychological characteristics of volunteers, including their psychological health, stress level, and sleep/awakening, were measured by interviewing. Beck Anxiety and Depression questionnaire, Granefski's Cognitive Emotion questionnaire, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, and Allport and Ross Questionnaire were used to collect required data; collected data was analyzed using Spss-v21, Pearson correlation coefficient and stepwise regression analysis. Based on the results of the present study, internal and external religious orientation -accounted for 57-61% of changes in depression variance, 53-54% changes in anxiety variance, 29-38% of changes in sleep quality variance, and 12-14% of changes in emotional cognitive regulation variance. The findings of the present study showed that the more external the religious orientation, the higher the level of depression, anxiety, and sleep quality; additionally, the more internal the religious orientation, the lower the level of depression, anxiety, and sleep quality. However, the more internal the religious orientation, the higher the level of emotional cognitive regulation and the more external the religious orientation, the lower the level of emotional cognitive adjustment. Students' mental health promotion depends on their beliefs, their sleep quality and their emotional cognitive configurations. In this regard, it is necessary to pay more attention to the teaching of theoretical, psychological, religious and cognitive principles regarding the quality of students' sleep.