Disturbed eating tendencies, health-related behaviors, and depressive symptoms among university students in Korea

Summary Background & aims There were few studies to investigate the related factors of depression among Korean students. Therefore, this study examined disturbed eating tendencies, health-related behaviors, and depressive symptoms among university students in Korea. Methods We conducted a cross-sectional survey on a total of 637 students (279 men and 358 women), and the Korean version of the Beck depression rating scale (K-BDI) was used to evaluate the students' depression status. Results Of the 637 students, 419 (65.8%) had no depressive symptoms (normal: K-BDI p  = .002), high level of life stress (OR = 4.37, 95% CI = 2.23 to 8.55; p p p  = .001) and self-esteem (self-esteem score≥30) (OR = 0.29, 95% CI = 0.20 to 0.43; p Conclusions This study confirmed that students with depressive symptoms tended to have disturbed eating behaviors, low body image satisfaction, low self-esteem, and high levels of stress.