Observing Correlations Between Lifestyle and Anxiety In High School and College Students

Andrew Boysia

School Name

Spring Valley High School

Grade Level

10th Grade

Presentation Topic

Psychology

Presentation Type

Non-Mentored

Abstract

Anxiety is a growing issue in modern adolescents. To minimize anxiety, the causes of growing anxiety should be examined. The purpose of this study was to observe the lifestyle choices of individuals and the anxiety they experience to find possible correlations in high school and college students. It was hypothesized that high school and college students with high anxiety will spend considerable time on social media, lack exercise, lack sleep, consume cannabis, vape, and/or drink alcohol often. Part of this prediction was based on previous studies suggesting that social media use causes lower self-esteem. Also, the lack of exercise removes distractions from studies, causing students to stress over school. In addition, high anxiety will be related to lower sleep because of sleep's ability to refuel oneself (Vaughn, E., 2019). High anxiety will also be related to high cannabis use, vaping often, and alcohol consumption because of the mental state altering capabilities of such substances. A survey was developed to determine if lifestyle choices are correlated with anxiety levels. This survey was generated in surveymonkey.com and was distributed to high school and college students via email and/or social media. 202 survey responses were used in data analysis. Every participant's response to each lifestyle question was compared to their calculated anxiety score, from the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and plotted on a scatter plot. Through linear regression tests, it was revealed that none of the lifestyle questions were significantly correlated to their anxiety score. All r2 values were less than 0.1.

Location

Furman Hall 207

Start Date

3-28-2020 10:15 AM

Presentation Format

Oral and Written

Group Project

No

COinS
 
Mar 28th, 10:15 AM

Observing Correlations Between Lifestyle and Anxiety In High School and College Students

Furman Hall 207

Anxiety is a growing issue in modern adolescents. To minimize anxiety, the causes of growing anxiety should be examined. The purpose of this study was to observe the lifestyle choices of individuals and the anxiety they experience to find possible correlations in high school and college students. It was hypothesized that high school and college students with high anxiety will spend considerable time on social media, lack exercise, lack sleep, consume cannabis, vape, and/or drink alcohol often. Part of this prediction was based on previous studies suggesting that social media use causes lower self-esteem. Also, the lack of exercise removes distractions from studies, causing students to stress over school. In addition, high anxiety will be related to lower sleep because of sleep's ability to refuel oneself (Vaughn, E., 2019). High anxiety will also be related to high cannabis use, vaping often, and alcohol consumption because of the mental state altering capabilities of such substances. A survey was developed to determine if lifestyle choices are correlated with anxiety levels. This survey was generated in surveymonkey.com and was distributed to high school and college students via email and/or social media. 202 survey responses were used in data analysis. Every participant's response to each lifestyle question was compared to their calculated anxiety score, from the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and plotted on a scatter plot. Through linear regression tests, it was revealed that none of the lifestyle questions were significantly correlated to their anxiety score. All r2 values were less than 0.1.