Abstract

THE PREVALENCE OF SOCIAL PHOBIA AND ITS POTENTIAL DEMOGRAPHICS CHARACTERISTICS RISK FACTORS, AMONG MEDICAL STUDENTS IN SYRIAN PRIVATE UNIVERSITY

Youssef Latifeh, Abdulaal Aless and Riham Salloum*

ABSTRACT

Objectives: study the prevalence of social phobia and potential risk triggers that may be associated with social phobia among Syrian private medical undergraduate students. Methods: Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale Test (LSAS) and a questionnaire assessing gender, Academic year, number of siblings, type of precedent school (mixed gender or not), smoking, father and mother educational level. Results: There were 285 medical students, (169) male & (116) female of which 21.8% of the medical students scored > 54 in (LSAS) suggesting that they having social phobia. The sample consisted of different academic years with the highest number from the 2th year (82, 28.8%) and the lowest number from the 5th year (30, 10.5%). Conclusion: Less than the quarter of the medical Syrian private university, students have significant social phobia. We found important significant risk triggers 0f social phobia including gender, academic year, smoking, number of siblings and mother educational level, but the association between social phobia and the academic average was not proved significant.

Keywords: Social phobia; Academic performance; Medical students.