CHAPTER FOUR

RESULTS

The age range of the respondents was from 18years to 55 years. For ease of analysis, the ages of the respondents were classified into five groups within the age range: 15-24 with 29.5% respondents, 25-34 with 36.5% respondents, 35-44 with 20.0% respondents, 45-54 with 12.5% respondents and 55-64 with 1.5%. The mean age was 31.55±0.73

About 75% of the respondents were Yoruba, 22.0% were Igbo and 3.0% were Hausa. There were more females(54.5%) than males (45.5%)

Analysis of the respondents’ occupation reveals that as large as 32.5% of them were unemployed, 32.0% were civil servants, about 17.5% were professionals, 15.5% were self employed and only 2.5% were artisans. Analysis of the respondents’ marital status shows that 62.0% of them were single, 36.0% married and 2.0% divorced. Majority of them, 79.0% were christians while 20.5% and 0.5% were muslims and traditional worshippers respectively.

Table 2 shows that 82.5% of the respondents knew about depression while 17.5% of the respondents had no knowledge of depression. The table also shows that less than half of the respondents were able to correctly identify each of the symptoms listed except in the case of ‘feeling of guilt’ where it was correctly identified by 52.7% of the respondents.

About 63.0% correctly identified ‘severe difficulties/life events’ as a possible cause of depression, 53.3%  also correctly identified wrong life style and 52.1%  believed problems with other people could lead to depression. ‘Physical abuse’ as a risk factor for depression was identified by 51.5% of  the respondents

Only 19.4% of the respondents knew that depression exists when depressive symptoms persist continuously for 2 weeks. About 26.6% of them also knew that depressive disorders could be classified into Unipolar and Bipolar disorders.

The results show that, 47.3% of respondents said they would first seek help from a General Medical Practitioner if they had depression and 5.4% saw traditional healers and religious priests respectively as their best option.

Majority(72.7%) of the respondents believed that counselling and support should be the first form of treatment for depression.Only 1.2% are of the opinion that herbs should be used first.

About 53.9% of the respondents believed anti depressants produce a satisfactory result in treating depression and 12.1% thought they have a high rate of compliance.

Majority(61.8%)of the respondents believed that sleep is a non pharmacological treatment for depression  and 18.8% believed beating/chaining respectively could be used as treatment for depression.

Table 3 shows the overall grade of respondents on the general knowledge of depression. A total of 28.5% of respondents had fair knowledge of depression, 52.1% had good knowledge of depression, and 19.4% had poor knowledge of depression.

The results show that 9.0% would not mind people knowing if they had depression while 28.5% believed the public should be protected from depressed people.

The results show that 13.3% of the respondents strongly agreed they could marry a depressed person while 12.7% strongly agreed that they do not mind having a neighbour with depression.

Only 7.3% of the respondents strongly believed depression occurs as a result of evil spirits, 12.7% also strongly agreed people with depression could make correct decisions about their lives.

About 7.2% of the respondents strongly believed depression was a punishment from God and 6.6% were of strong opinion that they could maintain friendship with people having depression.

A total of 7.2% of respondents strongly agreed that they would be ashamed to say someone in their family has depression while 15.1% were of strong opinion that a psychiatrist would be the best option when suffering from an emotional problem.

Majority of the respondents 55.8% had a positive attitude towards depression and 44.2% had a negative attitude towards depression.

From table 6 above, 8% of respondents in age group 15-24 had a good knowledge of depression, 3.3% and 12.1% of respondents in age groups 25-34 and 35-44 respectively had good knowledge of depression.

None of the respondents in age group 45-54 and 55-64 had good knowledge of depression.

The table also showed that there is no statistically significant relationship betweeen occupation and knowledge of depression since p value(0.452) is more than critical value (0.05)

Table 7 shows that 0.13% of male respondents have a good knowledge of depression and 10.1% of females had good knowledge of depression.

The table also shows that there is a statistically significant relationship between gender and knowledge of depression since p value (0.039) is less than critical value of (0.05)

From table 8 above, only 6.7% of the of the Christians had a good knowledge of depression while 3.2% of the Muslims had a good knowledge of depression.

The table also revealed that there is no statistically significant relationship between religion of the respondents and knowledge of depression since p value(0.35) is greater than critical value of 0.

From table 9 above, 18.9% of Igbo had poor knowledge of depression, 11.9% of Yoruba had  50.0% of Hausa also had poor knowledge of depression respectively.

The table reveals that there is no statistically significant relationship between the tribe of respondents and knowledge of depression since p value(0.285) is more than critical value of 0.05

From the table above, 64% of respondents in age group 15-24 had positive attitude to depression, 60% and 57.6% of respondents in the age groups 25-34 and 35-44 had positive attitude to depression respectively.

About 68.4% of respondents aged 45-54 had positive attitude to depression while 100% of adults aged 55-6 had a positive attitude towards depression.

The table also reveals that there is no statistically significant relationship between age and attitude to depression since p value (0.727) greater than critical value of 0.05

Table 11 shows that 63.2% of males and 61.8% of females had a positive attitude to depression respectively

The table also reveals that there is no statistically significant relationship between the occupation of respondents and attitude to depression since p value (0.857)greater than critical value of 0.05

From the table above, 65% of the christians had positive attitude to depression while 53% of muslims had a positive attitude to depression.

The table also reveals that there is no statistically significant relationship between respondents’ religion and attitude to depression since p value (0.157)greater than critical value of 0.05

From the table above, 70.0% of Igbo had positive attitude to depression, 59.6% of Yoruba and 100% of Hausa had positive attitude to depression.

The table also reveals that there is no statistically significant relationship between tribe of respondents and attitude to depression since p value (0.322) is greater than critical value of 0.05.