The Experimental Epidemiology Study Of College Students' Psychological Group Intervention

Objective 1)Explore the affection of self consistency and congruency and personality characteristics on the college student's anxiety and depression;2) Explore the function of psychological group intervention in improving the college student's self consistency and emotional problems like anxiety and depression;3) Explore the psychological and physical basis of improving the anxiety and depression by psychological group intervention.Means Explore an effective method to make the field of psychological intervention on college students more scientific,systematical and normal.Methods The study includes three main parts covering the impaction from the self consistency and the characteristics of personalities on the emotion,field experimental study of opened group intervention and closed pilot study of psychological group intervention.Subjects We choose the 2004 grade medical college students who take "the mental health education" as an elective course and volunteer to participate in this study as our subjects when they were freshman.Finally,821 subjects are qualified and there are 284 boys and 537 girls in them.This study takes 43 months in all.(April 2004- December 2007).The ways of psychological group intervention1.There are several important rules in the psychological group intervention:①Science.The design and process itself of the group intervention follow the epidemiological and psychological theory and ethics.We should guarantee that there are esteem,autonomy and no harm through the whole intervention.②Unconditional positive regards and esteem.③Interactive.④Construction.⑤Realistic.2.The framework of psychological group intervention programmeThe opened group intervention has been divided into five parts,and once a week,two hours each time.This group intervention goes with the structure of"v" type.It starts by acquaintance (full of love in our family);and it gradually leads the members to come into group atmosphere in "grateful heart(mood release)";then it gets the stage in which each one can profoundly engage in self-introspection and self-experience during "explore yourself(who am I)";it makes members get further development and growth in "my ideal and my goal";it ends by imaging the future in "my future is not just a dream".These five parts develop in order and each stage is the extension of the stage before and also the base of the later stage.And also these five developed stages happen to be the "V" type experience which every one feels in their psychological growing.For the design of closed pilot study of psychological group intervention,we propose the "U" type at the base of a number of relative books.That is to say,the process of activities and shares go from easy to difficult or complicated and finally return to the real life successfully. This intervention is composed of such themes which is started by acquaintance with each other, build trust in the group,explore oneself,the I who am in the primary family,the I who am in the interpersonal relationship,break oneself,show oneself and greet the future.The intervention goes with closed ways,eight times in four days in all,and half and two hours each time.3.Investigative tools and the index of evaluation on the effects①Self Consistency and Congruence Scale,made by Dengfeng Wang,includes 35 questions. This Scale showed that the disharmony of self and experience,and self-flexibility had higher confidence and forecast effect.The mode offered by Wang Dengfeng could differentiate the high score and low score in the disharmony of self and experience and self-flexibility.②Eysenck Personality Questionnaire(EPQ)[including 4 dimensions:Extraversion(E), Neuroticism(N),Psychoticism(P),Lie(L)]was made by Eysenck(English).The 88 items edition EPQ revised by Yao-Xian Gong was used in this investigation.It had high confidence and effect.Every item has "yes" and "no" answer to choose.③Self—Rating Depression Scale(SDS),made by William W.K.Zung in 1965,consists of 20 items and evaluates by 1～4 rank.④Self—Rating Anxiety Scale(SAS),made by William W.K.Zung in 1971,consist of 20 items and evaluates by 1～4 rank.⑤Test of reaction time(RT):The time from the stimulation to the response.The tester of multifunction in psychology and physiology of DDX-200 made by BO DA institute in Peking was used in this study.We take the audio simple RT,visual simple RT and attention allocation RT as our indexes.Units:s.⑥Stroop effect:The psychology experiment system(PES) of 2004 edition made by psychology department of Peking University was used to test the Stroop effect in this study.The PES is the only computer system authorized by national education committee.Units:ms.⑦Test of physiological functions:SN-695A intelligent RIA r measuring device made by RI HUAN device factory of Nuclear Research Institute in Shanghai was used to test the ACTH and IL-2.Units:pg/ml.⑧EEG:The portable electroencephalograph made by WEI SI Company in Nanjing was used in EEG depiction and BEAM spectrum analysis.The subjects should sit down and close their eyes quietly when depicting the EEG.We will take the BEAM,the Power value ofα1,α2,β1,β2, Symmetryα,βand EEG as our important indexes to analyze.4.Quality Control:The investigation hosted by the counselor himself,sticks strictly to the principle of respect,informed,voluntary and no harm.And unified instruction was given before answering.5.Data record:Epidata3.0 was used.6.Statistical analysis:SPSS13.0 software was used for data analysis;results were expressed by Mean±SD.And t test,simple linear correlation analysis,chi-square test,analysis of variance,repeated measures, analysis of covariance,multiple stepwise regression analysis and canonical correlation were the main methods used in this study.Results1.The survey results①The detection rate of anxiety level is 13.5%,in which the rate of severe anxiety is 1.1%. Thereis no difference in gender(F=2.017,P＞0.05).The detection rate of depression is 33.4%and in which the rate of severe depression accounted for 0.7%.There is no difference in gender(F=0.636,P＞0.05).②According to the mode offered by Dengfeng Wang,the subjects were differentiated the high score and low score in the level of disharmony of self and experience and self-flexibility.And the rates of the subjects with high score in the level of disharmony of self and experience and self-flexibility are respectively 43.2%and 64.2%;the rates with low score in these two levels are respectively 56.8%and 35.8%.There is also no difference in gender(F=2.213,P＞0.05;F =0.467,P＞0.05).③The results and analysis of the test of EPQ:It is obviously that the rate of the middle was highest in personality.The rates of boys and girls of introversion and instability are respectively 70%and 4.7%;And the rates of boys and girls of extraversion and instability are respectively 6.0%and 6.9%.The chi-square test proved that the difference is significant(x~2=24.618, P＜0.001).④Correlation analysis shows that both of anxiety and depression had remarkably correlation with all of the dimensions of self consistency and personality.2.Results of the field trial study of psychological group intervention:①The evaluation of the intervention itself and the effect from 772 students participated:There are 399 subjects(51.7%) who think this intervention best,319 subjects(41.3%) think better,52 subjects(6.7%) think good and 2 subjects(0.3%) think not so good;there are 169 subjects (21.9%) who think this intervention has great effect on them,236 subjects(30.6%) think the intervention has big effect on them,353 subjects(45.7%) think the intervention has effect on them,and 14 subjects(1.8%) think the intervention has no effect on them.②Comparisons between the scores before and after the intervention on anxiety,depression and self consistency and congruency from 413 subjects:Paired sample t test shows: post-treatment of the level of depression(t=-2.70,P＜0.05 ),the disharmony of self and experience(t=2.879,P＜0.05) and self-starchiness(t=4.357,P＜0.001) were respectively compared with those of pretreatment show obvious difference.③The analysis of stepwise regression on the effect of psychological group intervention:In order to prove the effect of the intervention,we take the level of anxiety and depression after the intervention and the change of those between before and after the intervention as the dependent variables "Y",and the general demographic indicators,3 dimensions of self consistency and congruence,4 dimensions of personality and some items of self self-assessing as the independent variables "X".The Selected standard and excluded standard of stepwise regression is respectively 0.15 and 0.20.The result shows:There are significant affection on the level of anxiety from the disharmony of self and experience(r=0.296),self-flexibility(r=-0.260),Neurotic of personality(r=0.037) and age(r=-0.693).But the evaluation of the intervention itself is not included by stepwise analysis.We cannot infer that the intervention does be effective in this perspective.And there is also significant affection on the level of depression from the remarks given on the intervention(r=0.011),Self-flexibility(r=-0.002),extroversion of personality (r=0.001) and gender(r=0.015).The level of depression after the intervention is reduced.There is significant affection on the change of the level of anxiety before and after the intervention from the change of the disharmony of self(r=0.017) and experience and depression(r=5.900),the change of self-flexibility(r=-0.122),The N(r=-0.177) and P(r=-0.087) of personality dimension, the level of confident(r=0.522)and the willing to be confident(r=-0.974).However,as the evaluation of the intervention itself is not included by stepwise analysis,we cannot infer that the intervention does be effective in this perspective.And there is significant affection on the change of depression from the change of the level of anxiety(r=0.001),gender(r=-0.017),the level of confident(r=-0.008)and the remark given on the intervention(r=-0.013).3.Results of the empirical study psychological group intervention:①Repeated measures and analysis of covariance were used in the analysis of the indexes got after the intervention.The result shows:The anxiety of the intervention group was compared with that of the control group showing no significant difference(F=1.985,P＞0.05).The level of anxiety of the intervention group increased far less than the control group,and we can infer that the intervention was useful in decreasing the level of anxiety.The depression of the intervention group was compared with that of the control group showing no significant difference.The level of depression of the intervention group was decreased while that of the control group was increased a little(F=7.264,P＜0.05).And then analysis of covariance shows that there are no difference on the level of the disharmony of self and experience between the intervention group and the control group(F =3.364,P＞0.05).Reverse result was found in the comparisons of the level of self-flexibility between the groups.The level of self-flexibility of the intervention group was much higher than that of the control group(F=4.940,P＜0.05).The level of IL-2 after the intervention was significantly higher than that before the intervention.There is no difference between the intervened and control group on the level of IL-2 after the intervention(F=0.750,P＞0.05 ).The level of ACTH after the intervention was significantly lower than that before the intervention. The level of ACTH of the control group is significantly higher than that of intervened group(F =5.523,P＜0.05).②The analysis of stepwise regression on the affections of the change of anxiety,depression and self consistency and congruency:To explore the psychological and physical mechanism of improving the anxiety and depression by psychological group intervention,we take the changes(the score pretest - the score post test) of the score of anxiety,depression and the three dimensions of self consistency and congruency as the dependent variables "Y",and the general demographic indicators,groups, 4 dimensions of personality and relative psychophysical indexes of as the independent variables "X".The Selected standard and excluded standard of stepwise regression is respectively 0.15 and 0.20.The results show that:With the increasing of the change of the slowest visual RT,the change of anxiety is decreasing too(r=0.002).With the increasing of the change of the time of reading the word in STROOP Effect,the change of self-flexibility is increasing(r=0.000).And the same result was found in the change of the time of identifying the colors(r=0.000) in STROOP Effect and average visual RT(r=0.008).With the increasing of the change of the level of the fast audio RT(r=0.013) and visual RT (r=0.012),the change of self-flexibility is increasing;but with the increasing of the change of the average visual RT(r=-0.004),the change of self-flexibility is decreasing.Both of the ACTH and IL-Ⅱare excluded by stepwise analysis.Conclusions1.Anxiety and depression are the key mental problem of the subjects in this study.The outcome shows that anxiety and depression are chiefly correlated with the level of the disharmony of self and experience and self-flexibility.2.We can improve the effect of the intervention by enhancing the technology of the intervention and making it more acceptable for the students with colorful activities.3.Psychological group intervention,as an efficient way of psychological intervention,is accepted by most of the college students.And the outcome of this study proves that it is effective to improve college students' harmony of self and experience and the emotion problem further.4.Psychological group intervention is a great way to help college students to come out of their mental problem.And the improvement of the level of anxiety,depression and self consistency can enhance the effectiveness of learning.The relationship of ACTH and IL-2 and the anxiety and depression of normal should make further discussion(r=0.002).