Young students’ lifestyle as a health risk factor during the COVID-19 pandemic under various anti-epidemic strategies

View or download the full article: 
PDF icon health-risk-analysis-2022-2-11.pdf
UDC: 
613.7
DOI: 
10.21668/health.risk/2022.2.11.eng
Authors: 

A.I. Shpakou1, L.G. Klimatckaia2, Yu.Yu. Bocharova2, A.A. Dyachuk2, O.Yu. Shik3

Organization: 

1Yanka Kupala State University of Grodno, 22 Ozheshko Str., Grodno, 230023, Republic of Belarus
2Krasnoyarsk State Pedagogical University named after V.P. Astafiev, 89 Ady Lebedevoy Str., Krasnoyarsk, 660049, Russian Federation
3Krasnoyarsk State Medical University named after Professor V.F. Voino-Yasenetsky, 1 Partizana Zheleznyaka Str., Krasnoyarsk, 660022, Russian Federation

Abstract: 

Various strategies have been implemented to prevent the COVID-19 spread both in Russia (self-isolation) and in Belarus (restrictive measures).

They can be considered an unordinary stress-inducing situation that involves drastic changes in a lifestyle.

Our research goal was to analyze students’ attitudes towards basic lifestyle components in both countries under various anti-epidemic strategies.

We interviewed 876 students from Krasnoyarsk who were self-isolated for 2.5 months and 1140 students from Grodno who did not face strict quarantine restrictions. We performed comparative assessment of changes in basic lifestyle components that occurred during the pandemic.
We established certain changes in subjective health self-assessment (more than a half of the students described it as bad), emotional state (subjective comfort index was between its acceptable level and a trend towards its deterioration). Acute deficiency of usual physical activity was mentioned by 35.4 % of the respondents from Krasnoyarsk and 29.5 % of their counterparts from Grodno (p < 0.01). Twenty-three point nine percent of the students from Grodno and 26.6 % form Krasnoyarsk gave up adhering to healthy sleep and nutrition regimes and this resulted in uncontrollable growth in body mass. The complex index of positive changes in a lifestyle, its maximum being seven scores, amounted to 4.15 ± 1.56 scores among the respondents in Krasnoyarsk against 4.46 ± 1.48 scores in the reference group (p < 0.01). Some respondents resorted to taking psychoactive substances in their search for subjective stability. Seven point seven percent of the students in Grodno and 4.8 % of their counterparts in Krasnoyarsk started smoking during that period; 28.9 % and 46.2 % of the respondents accordingly increased frequency and volumes of alcohol consumption (p < 0.01).

Therefore, the present study concentrated on analyzing specific attitudes towards lifestyles among students in two countries under various anti-epidemic strategies. The results provide significant information for both public healthcare organizations and educational establishments since they can be used as grounds for suggesting activities aimed at maintaining students’ wellbeing and providing wider opportunities for young people to pursue a healthy lifestyle.

Keywords: 
lifestyle, physical health, mental health, students from universities in Russia, students from universities in Belarus, COVID-19 pandemic, lockdown, anti-epidemic strategies
Shpakou A.I., Klimatckaia L.G., Bocharova Yu.Yu., Dyachuk A.A., Shik O.Yu. Young students’ lifestyle as a health risk factor during the COVID-19 pandemic under various anti-epidemic strategies. Health Risk Analysis, 2022, no. 2, pp. 119–127. DOI: 10.21668/health.risk/2022.2.11.eng
References: 
  1. Bondareva N.L. Commitment to a healthy lifestyle in the conditions of the pandemic. Inno-vatsionnye nauchnye issledovaniya, 2021, vol. 5, no. 3–1, pp. 122–127. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4677241 (in Russian).
  2. Iohvidov V.V. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle in self-isolation. Gumanitarnaya paradigma, 2020, vol. 3, no. 14, pp. 8–15 (in Russian).
  3. Advice for the public: Coronavirus disease (COVID-19). WHO, 2020. Available at: https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-f...? (24.10.2021).
  4. Van Duong T., Pham K.M., Do B.N., Kim G.B., Dam H.T.B., Le V.-T.T., Nguyen T.T.P., Nguyen H.T. [et al.]. Digital Healthy Diet Literacy and Self-Perceived Eating Behavior Change during COVID-19 Pandemic among Undergraduate Nursing and Medical Students: A Rapid Online Survey. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health, 2020, vol. 17, no. 19, pp. 7185. DOI: 10.3390/ijerph17197185
  5. Bertrand L., Shaw K.A., Ko J., Deprez D., Chilibeck P.D., Zello G.A. The impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on university students' dietary intake, physical activity, and sedentary behaviour. Appl. Physiol. Nutr. Metab., 2021, vol. 46, no. 3, pp. 265–272. DOI: 10.1139/apnm-2020-0990
  6. Briko N.I., Kagramanyan I.N., Nikiforov V.V., Suranova T.G., Chernyavskaya O.P., Polez-haeva N.A. Pandemic COVID-19. Prevention Measures in the Russian Federation. Epidemiologiya i Vaktsinoprofilaktika, 2020, vol. 19, no. 2, pp. 4–13. DOI: 10.31631/2073-3046-2020-19-2-4-12 (in Russian).
  7. Sychik S.I. Prevalence of behavioral risk factors that cause contagion with COVID-19 among population in Belarus: results obtained via cross-sectional study. Health Risk Analysis, 2020, no. 4, pp. 4–11. DOI: 10.21668/health.risk/2020.4.01.eng
  8. Potapova E.A., Zemlyanoy D.A., Kondratyev G.V. Features of Life and Well-Being in Medical Students During Distance Learning in the Course of the COVID-19 Epidemic. Psikhologicheskaya nauka i obrazovanie, 2021, vol. 26, no. 3, pp. 70–81. DOI: 10.17759/pse.2021260304 (in Russian).
  9. Wu L., Guo X., Shang Z., Sun Z., Jia Y., Sun L., Liu W. China experience from COVID-19: Mental health in mandatory quarantine zones urgently requires intervention. Psychol. Trauma, 2020, vol. 12, no. 5, pp. 3–5. DOI: 10.1037/tra0000609
  10. Sorokina E.A. Coronavirus Swedish Style. Meditsinskaya antropologiya i bioetika, 2020, vol. 1, no. 19, pp. 185–213. DOI: 10.33876/2224-9680/2020-1-19/11 (in Russian).
  11. Milman E., Lee S.A., Neimeyer R.A. Social isolation and the mitigation of coronavirus anxiety: The mediating role of meaning. Death Stud., 2020, vol. 46, no. 1, pp. 1–13. DOI: 10.1080/07481187.2020.1775362
  12. Odintsova M.A., Radchikova N.P., Yanchuk V.A. Assessment of the COVID-19 Pandemic Situation by Residents of Russia and Belarus. Sotsial'naya psikhologiya i obshchestvo, 2021, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 56–77. DOI: 10.17759/sps.2021120204 (in Russian).
  13. Son C., Hegde S., Smith A., Wang X., Sasangohar F. Effects of COVID-19 on College Students’ Mental Health in the United States: Interview Survey Study. J. Med. Internet Res., 2020, vol. 22, no. 9, pp. e21279. DOI: 10.2196/21279
  14. Shanshieva L. Belarus' 2020: koronavirus i bol'shaya politika [Belarus 2020: Coronavirus and Big Politics]. Evropeiskaya bezopasnost': sobytiya, otsenki, prognozy, 2020, vol. 73, no. 57, pp. 20–23 (in Russian).
  15. Gubenko S.I. Epidemic COVID-19. Belarus, Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark. Analysis, comparisons and forecasts. Vestnik nauki i obrazovaniya, 2020, vol. 94, no. 16, part 1, pp. 50–68. DOI: 10.24411/2312-8089-2020-11601 (in Russian).
  16. Karáth K. COVID-19: How does Belarus have one of the lowest death rates in Europe? BMJ, 2020, vol. 370, pp. m3543. DOI: 10.1136/bmj.m3543
  17. Popov V.I., Milushkina O.Yu., Sudakov D.V., Sudakov O.V. Lifestyle and health characteristics of students during distance learning. ZNiSO, 2020, no. 11, pp. 14–21. DOI: 10.35627/2219-5238/2020-332-11-14-21 (in Russian).
  18. Caputo E.L., Reichert F.F. Studies of Physical Activity and COVID-19 During the Pandemic: A Scoping Review. J. Phys. Act. Health, 2020, vol. 17, no. 12, pp. 1275–1284. DOI: 10.1123/jpah.2020-0406
  19. Meda N., Pardini S., Slongo I., Bodini L., Zordan M.A., Rigobello P., Visioli F., Novara C. Students’ mental health problems before, during, and after COVID-19 lockdown in Italy. J. Psychiatr. Res., 2021, vol. 134, pp. 69–77. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2020.12.045
  20. Zlotnikov A.G. COVID-19 pandemic in Belarus: demographic reflection. Nauka i innovatsii, 2021, vol. 215, no. 1, pp. 70–75 (in Russian).
  21. Popov A.O. Biomeditsinskaya etika provedeniya psikhologicheskikh issledovanii [Biomedical ethics of psychological research]. Kachestvennaya klinicheskaya praktika, 2010, no. 1, pp. 32–35 (in Russian).
  22. Denecke K., Bamidis P., Bond C., Gabarron E., Househ M., Lau A.Y.S., Mayer M.A., Merolli M., Hansen M. Ethical issues of social media usage in healthcare. Yearb. Med. Inform., 2015, vol. 10, no. 1, pp. 137–147. DOI: 10.15265/IY-2015-001
  23. Leonova A.B., Kapitsa M.S. Metody sub"ektivnoi otsenki funktsional'nykh sostoyanii cheloveka [Methods for subjective assessment of human functional states]. Praktikum po inzhenernoi psikhologii i ergonomike. In: Yu.K. Strelkov ed. Moscow, Izdatel'skii tsentr «Akademiya», 2003, pp. 136–167 (in Russian).
  24. Ryzhkova A.E. Otnoshenie studentov pedagogicheskogo vuza k podderzhaniyu osnov zdorovogo obraza zhizni v period pandemii koronavirusa v usloviyakh vynuzhdennoi samoizolyatsii [Attitudes of a pedagogical HEE to maintaining a healthy lifestyle during the coronavirus pandemic in forced self-isolation]. Matritsa nauchnogo poznaniya, 2020, no. 11–2, pp. 23–28 (in Russian).
  25. Rasskazova E.I., Leontiev D.A., Lebedeva A.A. Pandemic as a challenge to subjective well-being: anxiety and coping. Konsul'tativnaya psikhologiya i psikhoterapiya, 2020, vol. 28, no. 2, pp. 90–108. DOI: 10.17759/ cpp.2020280205 (in Russian).
  26. Flaudias V., Iceta S., Zerhouni O., Rodgers R.F., Billieux J., Llorca P.-M., Boudesseul J., de Chazeron I. [et al.]. COVID-19 pandemic lockdown and problematic eating behaviors in a student population. J. Behav. Addict., 2020, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. 826–835. DOI: 10.1556/2006.2020.00053.
  27. Carvalho V.O., Gois C.O. COVID-19 pandemic and home-based physical activity. J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. Pract., 2020, vol. 8, no. 8, pp. 2833–2834. DOI: 10.1016/j.jaip.2020.05.018
Received: 
21.02.2022
Approved: 
10.06.2022
Accepted for publication: 
21.06.2022

You are here

Home