Untangling Urban Minds: A Comprehensive Assessment of Mental Health Status among Young Adults in a Southern Indian city

Abstract

Background:
Mental health issues affecting social life and economic development of individuals, are often unrecognised and their impact on the patients, their families and society are underestimated. The objective of the study was to assess the mental health status of young adults and determine the factors affecting their mental health status.
Methods:
Community-based; cross-sectional study was conducted among 603 young adults (18-35 years) residing in an urban area of Dharwad city located in the southern part of India. General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12) was used to assess the mental health status and a pre-designed, pre-tested proforma was used for collecting data to know the factors affecting it. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics and chi-square test and odds ratio were used to find the association between two attributes.

Results:
Of the 603, majority 50.42% were in the age group of 24-29 years, 62.69% were males, 41.62% had completed secondary education, 39.14% were students, 55.39% were from nuclear family and 52.57% belonged to class II socio-economic status (SES). As per GHQ-12, 23.22% of young adults screened positive, indicating psychological distress, of which 97.14% had mild distress. Among males 29.63% had psychological distress, as compared to 12.44% females (OR=2.96, 95% CI=1.88-4.66, p<0.0001). Married individuals were less prone for psychological distress (χ2=8.048, p=0.005), whereas individuals aged 18-23 years (χ2=8.054, p=0.018), belonging to joint family (χ2=44.624, p<0.0001) and from class IV SES (χ2=173.009, p<0.0001) were more prone to psychological distress.
Conclusions:
Prevalence of psychological distress was 23.22%, of which 97.14% had mild distress. Factors associated with psychological distress were age, male gender, joint families, occupation, unmarried marital status and low SES.