Cross-Sectional Study on Mental Health in Pregnancy: Examining Roles of Age, Educational Status, Stages of Pregnancy, Year of Assessment, and Working Status

• Lusi Nuryanti

  Department of Psychology, Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia

• Suwanda Priyadi

  Department of Psychology, Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia

• Bayu Suseno

  Department of Psychology, Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia

• Audi Ahmad Rikardi

  Department of Psychology, Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta, Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia

Maternal mental health is a vital aspect of prenatal care as it determines the health and development of the baby born and the mother. Statistics show that globally, 10% pregnant women experience mental health disorders, which is higher in developing countries, with 15.6%. Anxiety and depression are two most prevalence disorders. Mental status of pregnant women is influenced by various demographic and socioeconomic factors. Low education, low social support, acute stressful events, low income, marital strain, a chronic health problem, country of birth, and smoking behaviour are factors that are associated with depression in pregnant women. This research aims to examine the correlation between mental health status in pregnant women and age, educational status, term of pregnancy, year of assessment, and working status. This research employs a quantitative correlational research design. Data were collected from 606 pregnant women who visited the Community Health Service at Ngemplak, Sleman, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, using the Self-Reporting Questionnaire (SRQ) to assess mental health conditions, alongside demographic data from their medical reports. Multiple regression analysis is utilized to determine the strength and significance of the relationships among these variables. The results of the study show that collectively, age, educational status, term of pregnancy, year of assessment, and working status significantly correlated with mental health status of pregnancy women. The coefficient of determination (R²) was .0425, indicating that approximately 4.25% of the variance in the dependent variable can be explained by the model, which includes five predictors. Age was not a significant predictor of the pregnancy women mental health, while higher education level result in lower mental health level. Working status did not significantly predict the mental health. In contrary, trimester of the pregnancy is a significant predictor of pregnancy women mental health status. In terms of year of assessment, there was no significant difference between 2023 and 2022, while the year 2024 was associated with significantly lower mental health score compared to 2022 and 2023. COVID 19 pandemics and its impacts on health facilities explains this result. The findings of this study contribute to a deeper understanding of maternal mental health and the predominant factors. The result from SRQ only shows whether pregnancy women have mental health disorders or not, which limit the study result. Further research is needed to apply more specific tools to determine the disorders. As this research results show the prevalence of pregnant women to experience mental health disorders is relatively high, the stakeholders should put extra attention to the quality and quantity of health service, especially for pregnant women.

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