Related factors of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms among adolescents after Wenchuan earthquake

Objective To understand the relationship between social support and coping style and the prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder(PTSD) among adolescents in disaster area after Wenchuan earthquake.Methods Totally 472 middle school students in Dujiangyan city of Sichuan province were investigated five months after Wenchuan earthquake with general questionnaire,social support rating scale,coping style questionnaire,and the Chinese version of the Impact of Event Scale(IES)-Revised.Results After the earthquake,220 (46.61%) adolescents show ed symptoms of PTSD,including 94 male(19.92%) and 126 female(26.69%).There was no significant difference in positive rate of PTSD symptoms betw een the male and the female(P> 0.05).There was no significant difference in objective support,subjective support,utilization of social support,and the total score of social support betw een the students with and without PTSD symptoms (P>0.05 for all).But there were significant diffeneces in self-blame,resort,illusion,retreat,and rationalization between the adolscents with and without PTSD symptoms(P< 0.05).Correlation analyses indicated that objective support was negatively correlated with intrusion,high alert and total score IES (P< 0.05); rationalization was negatively correlated with high alert (P<0.05); resort was negatively correlated with intrusion factor and total score of IES; self-blame,illusion,retreat,and rationalization were positively correlated with avoidance,intrusion,high alert,and total score of IES (P< 0.01 for all).Conclusion Application of mature coping style and good social support can improve the mental health and reduce prevalence of PTSD among adolescents.