Prevalence of co-occurring severe depression and psychotic symptoms in college students and its relationship with childhood maltreatment

BACKGROUND: It has been demonstrated that childhood maltreatment (CM) is associated with an increased risk of depression and psychotic symptoms. However, there is still a lack of studies on the prevalence of co-occurring severe depression and psychotic symptoms (CSDPS) and the association between CM and CSDPS among college students. OBJECTIVE: We aim to investigate the prevalence and demographic distribution of CSDPS among Chinese college students and to examine its relationship with CM. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: A total of 7351 college students aged 18 and above completed the survey. Finally, 6854 valid questionnaires were included for further analysis. METHODS: The Childhood Trauma Questionnaire and the item for witnessing domestic violence were used to assess the CM. The Prodromal Questionnaire-16 and the depression subscale of the Depression Anxiety and Stress-21 scale were used to assess psychotic symptoms and depressive symptoms. RESULTS: The prevalence of CSDPS was 1.47 % among the college students. The multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that emotional abuse and emotional neglect were associated with an increased risk of CSDPS (all p < 0.05). The risk of CSDPS was dramatically increased for individuals who had experienced ≥3 types of CM (OR = 22.929, p < 0.001), as compared to those who had experienced 1-2 types of CM (OR = 4.452, p < 0.001) and those without the experience of CM. CONCLUSION: CM was found to be associated with an increased risk of CSDPS among the college students. Notably, experiencing more types of CM was also associated with a higher risk of CSDPS.