Published on February 2021 | Mental Health, Psychology, Lifestyle

Assessment of health promoting lifestyle practices and mental health status among apparently healthy undergraduate students of a premier Indian university during the COVID-19 Lockdown

Introduction: Health promoting lifestyle practices (HPLP) are upcoming areas of healthcare physiological sciences which are known to yield significant preventive and therapeutic modalities for numerous somatic and psychological infirmities. Objectives: The present novel study was designed to assess the differences in the HPLP between apparently healthy male and female undergraduate students of an Indian university and to find out the relationship between HPLP and mental health (MH) status during the socially stressful COVID-19 lockdown period between March 2020 and August 2020. Methodology: In our present work, apparently healthy students (100 male and 100 female) pursuing their undergraduate degree in various faculties of Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India were recruited. They were asked to fill the standard HPLP and MH Inventory questionnaires in a supervised environment through online platform, after which dimension-wise HPLP and MH scorings were done and results were analyzed. Results: Our observations show that female students possessed better HPLP and MH status as compared to their male counterparts. Female subjects have scored more than the male subjects in HPLP dimensions like health responsibility, physical activity, nutrition and stress management and in MH dimensions like positive self-evaluation, integration of personality, group oriented attitude and environmental competence. In both gender groups, the HPLP were positively correlated with MH status and vice versa. Conclusion: The present work gives valuable insights regarding the beneficial effects of HPLP towards improving MH status in a potentially stressful social environment.