The relationship between religiosity with stress, anxiety, and depression among the students in Kurdistan University of Medical Sciences, Iran, 2017

BACKGROUND: Religion affects all aspects of the life. One of the most important aspects of human health is its mental health, and how it gets affected by stress, anxiety, and depression. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether there was any relationship between religiosity with stress, anxiety, and depression among the students of Kurdistan University of Medical Sciences, Iran. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was conducted at Kurdistan University of Medical Sciences in 2017. The total number of 282 students were selected using a two-stage stratified sampling method to fulfill univariate religiosity questionnaire and Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21). All statistical analysis was performed using SPSS software. RESULTS: The mean age of participants was 22.34 ± 3.05 years. 70.9% of participants were women, and 92.2% were single. Out of four dimensions of religiosity, only ritual dimension was found to have a significant correlation with stress (P = 0.030). The correlation between other dimensions of religiosity (belief, emotional, and consequential (and aspects of mental health found to be not statistically significant (P > 0.050). CONCLUSION: Based on the findings of this study, religious activities can reduce the stress of individuals. Designing non-syllabus interventions is recommended in order to increase religious activities in order to improve students' mental health