C. Wong, Hong Kong PRC
The University of Hong Kong Department of PsychiatryPresenter of 5 Presentations
EPP0099 - Psychotic-like experiences in community-dwelling young people in Hong Kong: preliminary finding from the Hong Kong Youth Epidemiological Study of Mental Health (HKYES)
ABSTRACT
Introduction
Psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) are often referred to as psychotic experiences, such as hallucinations and delusions, in the absence of a psychotic disorder. PLEs as part of the continuum of psychosis suggested that healthy population can endorse PLEs without having significant distress or impairment which would warrant them a clinical diagnosis. While PLEs are usually associated with psychotic disorders, previous research has also shown the link between PLEs and many other mood symptoms.
Objectives
The present study aims to identify PLEs in community youths and explore the underlying risk and protective factors.
Methods
This is an ongoing study in which young people aged 15-24 were recruited from community through a random stratified sampling method. Sociodemographic, lifestyle, functioning, and other psychosocial factors were assessed in a face-to-face structured interview. In particular, PLEs were assessed using the Composite International Diagnostic Interview Screening Scales (CIDI-SC). Six domains of lifetime PLEs were measured, including auditory and visual hallucination, thought insertion/ withdrawal, delusion of control and reference, and persecutory delusions.
Results
To date, 746 participants were recruited and of these, 3.2% of them has endorsed lifetime PLEs. Results showed that significantly higher depressive, anxiety and stress scores were found in those who has PLEs (p<0.001), and additionally, these scores significantly predicted the presence of PLEs in regression models (p<0.001).
Conclusions
Our preliminary findings highlighted the inter-related phenomena between PLEs and mood symptoms. Further investigation is needed to examine the likelihood of PLEs in predicting psychosis over time.
EPP0101 - Smartphone internet addiction among Hong Kong young adults: the role of gender and depression
ABSTRACT
Introduction
Growing evidence studying pathological online behaviour has shown an increasing rate of internet addictions in younger populations across the globe.
Objectives
The current study aims to investigate the prevalence of smartphone internet addiction of youths in Hong Kong, and its associations with gender and depression.
Methods
A total of 1,164 participants’ preliminary data were extracted from the Hong Kong Youth Epidemiological Study of Mental Health, a territory-wide, household-based study of mental health in youths aged between 15-24. Internet usage behaviors, socio-demographic and psychosocial characteristics of the participants were assessed. The Chen Internet Addiction Scale was modified to measure smartphone internet addiction (SIA). Symptoms of depression were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire. Mann-Whitney U tests were used to examine (i) SIA across gender and (ii) depressive symptoms between high and no to low SIA groups. Linear regression model was used to evaluate the association between SIA and depression.
Results
The prevalence of smartphone internet addiction was 27.8% using the cut-off scores of 67/68. Women had higher SIA scores than men (U=144239.50, p=0.001). Participants with high SIA were associated with a higher severity in depression than those with no-to-low SIA (U=89187.00, p<0.001). Regression analysis revealed a significant positive correlation between depression and SIA after adjusting for confounding factors (B=0.099, t=9.138, p<0.001).
Conclusions
Our findings suggest a gender difference on online behaviour using smartphones. Further investigations are needed on whether SIA may exacerbate severity of common mental disorders.
EPP0356 - The mental health impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on Hong Kong youth: preliminary results from the Hong Kong Youth Mental Health Epidemiological Study (HKYES)
ABSTRACT
Introduction
The 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is a global health crisis that originated in China. As an adjacent city to the origin of COVID-19, Hong Kong has been facing different public health challenges raised by the epidemic.
Objectives
This paper examined the prevalence of common physical symptoms, psychological symptoms, somatic symptoms, and health anxiety among the Hong Kong youth population.
Methods
HKYES is an on-going territory-wide epidemiological study collecting youth mental health data with randomly stratified sampling. Participants aged 15-24 years were to complete a physical symptom checklist, Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21), Insomnia Severity Index (ISI), Patient Health Questionnaire-15 (PHQ-15), and Short Health Anxiety Inventory (SHAI).
Results
A total of 594 participants have completed the survey since April 2020. The three most common physical symptoms were headache (n=106, 17.8%), fever (n=94, 15.8%) and fatigue (n=78, 13.1%). The mean scores of DASS depression, anxiety and stress subscales were 7.98 (SD 8.14), 5.81 (SD 6.32), and 8.83 (SD 7.93) respectively. Among all, 135 (22.8%) participants reported moderate to severe levels of depressive symptoms, 133 (22.4%) reported moderate to severe levels of anxiety symptoms, and 71 (12%) reported moderate to severe levels of stress. There were 40 (6.7%) and 60 (10.1%) participants showing significant levels of insomnia and somatic symptoms, while around one-third of the participants reported a high level of health anxiety.
Conclusions
Youth is at risk of severe psychological impact during the coronavirus. Monitoring the mental health trajectory for youth should become routine practice during times of crisis.
EPP0651 - Adverse childhood experiences, family relationship and generalized anxiety in the youth population in Hong Kong
ABSTRACT
Introduction
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are shown to be risk factors for developing anxiety later in life. However, one’s family relationship acts as a protective factor between ACEs and anxiety.
Objectives
The present study examines the interaction between ACEs and family relationship and their effect on generalized anxiety (GA) amongst the youth population in Hong Kong.
Methods
Participants aged 15-24 were recruited from a population-based epidemiological study in Hong Kong. GA in the past two weeks was assessed using GAD-7, while ACEs were measured using the childhood section of Composite International Diagnostic Interview screening scales (CIDI-SC), encompassing parental psychopathology, physical, emotional, sexual abuse, and neglect before age 17. Family relationship was measured by the Brief Family Relationship Scale (BFRS). Linear regression and a two-way ANCOVA were conducted to examine the association between ACEs, family relationship and GA, while adjusted for age and gender.
Results
633 (70.7%) out of 895 participants had any ACEs. ACEs significantly predicted GAD-7 scores (Β=1.272, t(891)=4.115, p<.001). Two-way ANCOVA reported a significant interaction effect of ACEs and family relationship on GA (F(1, 889)=4.398, p=.036), namely those who had any ACEs and poorer family relationship scored higher in GAD-7 (p<.001), whereas there was no difference in family relationship for those without ACEs on GA (p=.501).
Conclusions
ACEs increases the vulnerability to GA later in life. However, its effect on anxiety decreases when one has a better family relationship. This suggests a possible moderating role of family relationship in developing GA among younger people.
O142 - Constructing socioeconomic index (SEI) in predicting mental health in young adults
ABSTRACT
Introduction
Socioeconomic status (SES) are well known to be associated with mental health. Previous studies are often restricted by the use of individual SES indicators, while contextual measures aggregating multiple dimensions would present a better picture of SES in multivariate context.
Objectives
The present study aims to construct the socioeconomic index (SEI) by integrating significant socioeconomic factors in predicting mental health of young adults in Hong Kong.
Methods
Data were drawn from the Hong Kong Youth Epidemiological Study of Mental Health (HKYES), a population-based psychiatric study of young people in Hong Kong. The present study exacted data of 1,164 participants who had completed baseline interviews between April 2019 to August 2020. Socioeconomic characteristics including age, gender, education years, income, expenditure, home ownership, housing type, household crowdedness and parental occupation were collected. Data were checked for the assumptions for normality, linearity and homoscedasticity before the standardized SEI were derived using Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Logistic regression analyses were performed to further examine the association between SEI and mental health outcomes.
Results
Our results identified five significant socioeconomic factors (education years, personal income, home ownership, housing type and household crowdedness) which together explained 67.7% of the total variation. SEI was associated with depression (OR=0.671, p=.003) and anxiety (OR=0.667, p=.015) after adjusting for potential confounders.
Conclusions
The PCA-generated SEI took account of the multiple dimensions of SES in younger adults including education, income, expenditure and housing. The indices would provide meaningful contextual information of SES across geographical areas or different groups of interest.