Psychological and social aspects of disease prevention
Mohammad Hadi Yadollahpour; Danial Masoudi; Angela Hamidia; ُSoraya Khafri; Neda Ahangari; Mahbobeh Faramarzi
Abstract
Objective: Psychological defense mechanisms reflect how individuals cope with conflicts and stress. This study aimed to describes defense mechanisms in medical interns and their correlation with spiritual health.Method: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on medical students of the academic ...
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Objective: Psychological defense mechanisms reflect how individuals cope with conflicts and stress. This study aimed to describes defense mechanisms in medical interns and their correlation with spiritual health.Method: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on medical students of the academic year 2023. 168 medical interns meeting the study criteria completed two questionnaires including defense mechanisms (DSQ-40) by Andrews et al. (1993) and spiritual health Paloutzian and Ellison (1982) .The analysis was performed using SPSS.v25 software with Pearson, t-tests, and ANOVA tests.Results: The mean score of mature defense mechanisms (43.31±16.83) among medical interns was higher than immature (98.52±52.8) and neurotic (36.75±18.3) defense mechanisms. The immature defense mechanism was significantly higher in males compared to in females (99.43±23.41 vs 108.47±23.21, p=0.014). Also, the mean score of immature defense mechanisms in single individuals was significantly higher than in married ones (106.66±24.02 vs 93.12±19.56, p=0.001). The spiritual health of interns had a significant and direct correlation (r=0.249) with mature defense mechanisms and a significant negative correlation (r=-0.336) with immature defense mechanisms.Conclusion: Higher spiritual health in medical interns is associated with greater use of mature defense mechanisms and lesser use of immature defense mechanisms.Keywords: defense mechanisms, spiritual health, medical interns, mature defense, immature defense.
