Association Of, Perceived Stress And Substance Use Disorders, Among Students At The University Of Nairobi

Abstract

Various studies have separately reported a high prevalence of perceived stress and a high prevalence of alcohol and drug use among university students in Kenya. The study investigated the association between perceived stress and alcohol and drug use among undergraduate students of the University of Nairobi.The main objective was to investigate the association between perceived stress and alcohol and drug use disorder.This was a cross sectional study carried out in six colleges of the University of Nairobi. Multistage stratified sampling was used to randomly select participants. One faculty from each of the six colleges was randomly selected for the study and students in the selected faculty were randomly selected from the faculty register. Socio-demographic data was collected using self-administered structured questionnaire. Data on perceived stress were collected using Cohens perceived stress scale. Data on alcohol and drug use was collected through interview using ASSIST questionnaire. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 was used for data analysis. A total of 371 (96.6%) respondents participated out of 384 randomly selected. Mean perceived stress score for all respondents was 16.7 (S. D 3.8). Female respondents mean perceived stress was 17.9(S. D 3.6) and was significantly higher than perceived stress for male respondents of 15.7 (S. D 3.8) p<0.05. Among those using alcohol and tobacco, mean perceived stress was 19.6 (S. D 10.4) and tobacco 20.2 (S. D 8.8) respectively. Mean levels for both groups was significantly higher than those for those who do not use. There was no association between perceived stress levels and age, place of residence, religion and module of study. Perceived stress was significantly associated with alcohol and tobacco use among the students of the University of Nairobi. There is a need to scale up education on prevention of alcohol and drug use among the students. The University of Nairobi management needs to start stress management programs for the students.