a growing experience - Student Services - University of Melbourne

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HEALTH AND WELL-BEING OF INTERNATIONAL STUDENTSGuidelines for the rating of severity of scores, based on the normative sample, havebeen established for the DASS scales. Using these guidelines, it is possible to classifystudent scale scores on a continuum from normal to extremely severe. The results arepresented in Table 39. Just as the means of the three scales are slightly higher thanthe means of the normative sample, so too the distributions of scale scores in thepresent sample are skewed compared with the distributions of the normative sample.However, there is need for great caution in interpreting these data. The scales werenormed on an Australian sample drawn from a range of white and blue collaroccupations, including some university students, with an age range of 17 – 69 years.In particular, cultural differences will have affected present results in an unknownway. The most useful approach is to look at the relative distributions of scores on thethree scales for the international student sample. From this it can be seen that anxietypresents a greater challenge to this group than either depression or stress.Table 39Classification of students’ scale scores according to degree of severityNormalMildModerateSevereExtremely severeDepressionscale (n=963)NumberPercentageAnxiety scale(n=961)NumberPercentageStress scale(n=959)NumberPercentage(Normativesample: 78%)59461.754857.065668.4(Normativesample: 9%)13213.710310.710811.3(Normativesample: 8%)14515.016917.610911.3(Normativesample: 3%)515.3555.8626.5(Normativesample: 2%)414.3868.9242.5Factors differentiating among students in terms of their levels of depression seem tofocus on maturity, connectedness and cultural stress, and progress with studies.• There is a significant negative correlation with age, indicating in general theyounger the student the higher the level of depression 201 .• Single students have a significantly higher score on the Depression scale thanstudents with partners 202 .• Undergraduate students have a significantly higher Depression scale score thanpostgraduate students (whether coursework or research) 203 .• Students who feel their academic progress is below expectation have significantlyhigher levels of depression than other students doing as well as or better thanexpected 204 .• Students who undertook a Foundation Studies program have a significantly higherDepression scale score than those who did not 205 .201 =-0.15, p
HEALTH AND WELL-BEING OF INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS• There was a main effect for country category, with students from European andLatin American students having the lowest Depression scale scores, and studentsfrom India, Hong Kong, Other Africa and Malaysia having the highest 206 .There are also significant correlations between the Depression scale and other scalesalready discussed.• A significant negative correlation exists between the Connectedness and theDepression scales, indicating that the stronger the connectedness of the student inMelbourne, the lower the level of depression 207 .• A strong, significant positive correlation exists between the Cultural Stress andthe Depression scales, indicating that the stronger the student’s experience ofcultural stress in Melbourne, the higher the level of depression 208 . In particular, asignificant main effect on depression for level of stress experienced by students intrying to meet family expectations (item B27, one of the items of the CulturalStress scale) exists, with significant increases in the Depression scale score foreach successive rating level (0 to 3) on item B27 209 .• There are also significant positive correlations between the Depression scale andthe Abuse and Distress scale 210 , as well as with three scales that are discussed inthe subsequent section of results concerning health-related behaviour: thePerceptions of Drug Use 211 scale, the Perceptions of Alcohol Use 212 scale, and thePerceptions of Gambling and Smoking 213 scale.In order to determine the best predictors of the Depression scale, all of the abovetwelve variables were entered into a multiple linear regression analysis. The modelachieved provides a significant prediction of the Depression scale (F(3,153)=19.81,p
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