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Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study

BACKGROUND: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with several adverse health outcomes. However, few studies in sub-Saharan Africa have examined its deleterious consequences on mental health. Therefore, we investigated the prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and psychologi...

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Autores principales: Boateng, Godfred O., Doku, David Teye, Enyan, Nancy Innocentia Ebu, Owusu, Samuel Asiedu, Aboh, Irene Korkoi, Kodom, Ruby Victoria, Ekumah, Benard, Quansah, Reginald, Boamah, Sheila A., Obiri-Yeboah, Dorcas, Nsabimana, Epaphrodite, Jansen, Stefan, Armah, Frederick Ato
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8149916/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34039313
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10998-0
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author Boateng, Godfred O.
Doku, David Teye
Enyan, Nancy Innocentia Ebu
Owusu, Samuel Asiedu
Aboh, Irene Korkoi
Kodom, Ruby Victoria
Ekumah, Benard
Quansah, Reginald
Boamah, Sheila A.
Obiri-Yeboah, Dorcas
Nsabimana, Epaphrodite
Jansen, Stefan
Armah, Frederick Ato
author_facet Boateng, Godfred O.
Doku, David Teye
Enyan, Nancy Innocentia Ebu
Owusu, Samuel Asiedu
Aboh, Irene Korkoi
Kodom, Ruby Victoria
Ekumah, Benard
Quansah, Reginald
Boamah, Sheila A.
Obiri-Yeboah, Dorcas
Nsabimana, Epaphrodite
Jansen, Stefan
Armah, Frederick Ato
author_sort Boateng, Godfred O.
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with several adverse health outcomes. However, few studies in sub-Saharan Africa have examined its deleterious consequences on mental health. Therefore, we investigated the prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in Ghana. METHODS: Data for this study were drawn from an online survey of 811 participants that collected retrospective information on mental health measures including symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder, boredom, and well-being. Additional data were collected on COVID-19 related measures, biosocial (e.g. age and sex) and sociocultural factors (e.g., education, occupation, marital status). Following descriptive and psychometric evaluation of measures used, multiple linear regression was used to assess the relationships between predictor variables and boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being scores during the pandemic. Second, we assessed the effect of anxiety on psychological well-being. Next, we assessed predictors of the changes in boredom, anxiety, and well-being. RESULTS: Before the COVID-19 pandemic, 63.5% reported better well-being, 11.6% symptoms of anxiety, and 29.6% symptoms of boredom. Comparing experiences before and during the pandemic, there was an increase in boredom and anxiety symptomatology, and a decrease in well-being mean scores. The adjusted model shows participants with existing medical conditions had higher scores on boredom (ß = 1.76, p < .001) and anxiety (ß = 1.83, p < .01). In a separate model, anxiety scores before the pandemic (ß = -0.25, p < .01) and having prior medical conditions (ß = -1.53, p < .001) were associated with decreased psychological well-being scores during the pandemic. In the change model, having a prior medical condition was associated with an increasing change in boredom, anxiety, and well-being. Older age was associated with decreasing changes in boredom and well-being scores. CONCLUSIONS: This study is the first in Ghana to provide evidence of the changes in boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings underscore the need for the inclusion of mental health interventions as part of the current pandemic control protocol and public health preparedness towards infectious disease outbreaks. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12889-021-10998-0.
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spelling pubmed-81499162021-05-26 Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study Boateng, Godfred O. Doku, David Teye Enyan, Nancy Innocentia Ebu Owusu, Samuel Asiedu Aboh, Irene Korkoi Kodom, Ruby Victoria Ekumah, Benard Quansah, Reginald Boamah, Sheila A. Obiri-Yeboah, Dorcas Nsabimana, Epaphrodite Jansen, Stefan Armah, Frederick Ato BMC Public Health Research BACKGROUND: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has been associated with several adverse health outcomes. However, few studies in sub-Saharan Africa have examined its deleterious consequences on mental health. Therefore, we investigated the prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in Ghana. METHODS: Data for this study were drawn from an online survey of 811 participants that collected retrospective information on mental health measures including symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder, boredom, and well-being. Additional data were collected on COVID-19 related measures, biosocial (e.g. age and sex) and sociocultural factors (e.g., education, occupation, marital status). Following descriptive and psychometric evaluation of measures used, multiple linear regression was used to assess the relationships between predictor variables and boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being scores during the pandemic. Second, we assessed the effect of anxiety on psychological well-being. Next, we assessed predictors of the changes in boredom, anxiety, and well-being. RESULTS: Before the COVID-19 pandemic, 63.5% reported better well-being, 11.6% symptoms of anxiety, and 29.6% symptoms of boredom. Comparing experiences before and during the pandemic, there was an increase in boredom and anxiety symptomatology, and a decrease in well-being mean scores. The adjusted model shows participants with existing medical conditions had higher scores on boredom (ß = 1.76, p < .001) and anxiety (ß = 1.83, p < .01). In a separate model, anxiety scores before the pandemic (ß = -0.25, p < .01) and having prior medical conditions (ß = -1.53, p < .001) were associated with decreased psychological well-being scores during the pandemic. In the change model, having a prior medical condition was associated with an increasing change in boredom, anxiety, and well-being. Older age was associated with decreasing changes in boredom and well-being scores. CONCLUSIONS: This study is the first in Ghana to provide evidence of the changes in boredom, anxiety and psychological well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings underscore the need for the inclusion of mental health interventions as part of the current pandemic control protocol and public health preparedness towards infectious disease outbreaks. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12889-021-10998-0. BioMed Central 2021-05-26 /pmc/articles/PMC8149916/ /pubmed/34039313 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10998-0 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research
Boateng, Godfred O.
Doku, David Teye
Enyan, Nancy Innocentia Ebu
Owusu, Samuel Asiedu
Aboh, Irene Korkoi
Kodom, Ruby Victoria
Ekumah, Benard
Quansah, Reginald
Boamah, Sheila A.
Obiri-Yeboah, Dorcas
Nsabimana, Epaphrodite
Jansen, Stefan
Armah, Frederick Ato
Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title_full Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title_fullStr Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title_full_unstemmed Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title_short Prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic: a population-based study
title_sort prevalence and changes in boredom, anxiety and well-being among ghanaians during the covid-19 pandemic: a population-based study
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8149916/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34039313
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-021-10998-0
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