Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Gene Reports
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/genrep

Exploring unprecedented problems of academicians during the COVID 19

pandemic and their relationships with fatigue and mental health
Fakhradin Ghasemi a, Maryam Zarei b, Rashid Heidarimoghadam c, Seyed Mostafa Hosseini d, *
a
Department of Ergonomics, Occupational Health & Safety Research Center, School of Public Health, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran
b
Department of Occupational Health and Safety Engineering, School of Public Health, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran
c
Department of Ergonomics, Research Center for Health Sciences, School of Public Health, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran
d
Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, IR, Iran

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: This study aimed to explore the unprecedented problems of academicians during the COVID-19 pandemic and
Fatigue investigate the effects of these problems on perceived fatigue and mental health of academicians. A number of
Mental health academicians were first interviewed and the main problems created by the pandemic were explored. Based on
Faculty
the explored items a questionnaire was developed and using Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) the main com­
COVID-19
ponents of the questionnaire were extracted. Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory and General Health Ques­
tionnaire were used to measure perceived fatigue and mental health. Regression analysis was used to analyze
data. A total number of 172 academicians from an Iranian university participated in this study. The use of new
technologies for online/offline education, delays in research projects, conflicts with students, and taking care of
children were the main concerns of academicians during the pandemic. According to EFA, unprecedented
problems of academicians (UPPA) were categorized into two main groups: those related to the university and
those related to family. UPPA components affected mental fatigue significantly. However, their effects on
physical fatigue were not significant. UPPA components significantly affected all dimensions of mental health.
Gender was significantly associated with somatic symptoms and anxiety/insomnia. Academicians have faced
new problems during the COVID-19 pandemic. These problems can affect fatigue and mental health among them.
Authorities should take actions to remedy these problems.

1. Introduction loneliness, increased risk of cardiovascular diseases, stress, anxiety and

Iran is one of the countries most affected by the novel coronavirus
disease (COVID-19). Based on the statistics reported by the Ministry of
Health and Medical Education of Iran, almost more than one million
people have been infected by the virus and 51,496 individuals have lost
their lives until 10 December 2020. Similar to other countries, Iran has
also implemented severe social restrictions since the inception of the
disease. Social distancing and lockdown were main restrictions imple­
mented by the government to stop the spread of COVID-19 in Iran.
Although effective in reducing the incidence of disease, social re­
strictions can significantly affect both physical and mental health of the
society (Holmes et al., 2020). Consequently, a high volume of studies has
been conducted to identify the undesired consequences of the pandemic.
Psychological consequences of the pandemic have been the topic of
many studies. Restrictions resulted from the pandemic can lead to
depression (Brewer and Stratton, 2020; Leigh-Hunt et al., 2017).
Reduced sleep quality is another outcome of the pandemic which has
been mentioned in several studies. Marelli et al. (Marelli et al., 2020)
found that the pandemic reduced the sleep quality and increased
insomnia symptoms among university students and administrative staff.
Cellini et al. (2020) outlined that the lockdown has led to significant
changes in sleep pattern of people so that they believed their sleep
quality has decreased. As sleep quality is an important determinant of
fatigue (Ghasemi et al., 2019; Techera et al., 2016), it is also expected
that perceived fatigue can be another undesired outcome of such social
restrictions. Perceived fatigue, which is self-reported and measured
using various questionnaires, reflects a disinclination to be involved in
physical or mental activities. In this regard, a study by Bartoszek et al.
(2020) carried out among a general population reported that people had
higher scores of fatigue during the pandemic. A study in Turkey

* Corresponding author at: Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Shahid Fahmideh BLVD, Hamadan, Iran.
E-mail address: smhoseiny88@yahoo.com (S.M. Hosseini).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.genrep.2021.101098
Received 24 January 2021; Received in revised form 1 March 2021; Accepted 12 March 2021
Available online 18 March 2021
2452-0144/© 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
F. Ghasemi et al.
demonstrated that 64.1% of the general population were psycholog­
ically fatigued (Morgul et al., 2020). Alongside mentioned psychological
consequences, the physical health of people may also be threatened by
the pandemic. As people have to stay home during strict social re­
strictions, physical inactivity and sedentary behavior are expected to
increase (Margaritis et al., 2020). Lack of physical activity has been
known as an important cause of musculoskeletal discomforts (Memari
et al., 2020). In this regard, a study in Turkey demonstrated that the
prevalence of low back pain among workers who stayed at home during
the pandemic was higher than those who continued to work at work­
places (Toprak Celenay et al., 2020). In the same vein, Shariat et al.
(2020) explained that staying home during the pandemic may increase
complaints regarding the neck, shoulder and lower back as a result of
increased sedentary behavior and recommended home-based exercises
to minimize or prevent such complaints.
Evidently, healthcare workers are more affected than other working
groups as they are in a direct contact with patients supposed to be
infected by the virus (Chew et al., 2020b). Stress, anxiety, depressive
symptoms, post trauma stress disorder (PTSD), and insomnia are some
mental disorders which may be experienced by healthcare workers
during this period (Chew et al., 2020a; Shaukat et al., 2020; Spoorthy,
2020). Other outcomes of the pandemic among healthcare staff are
burnout and fatigue (Kannampallil et al., 2020; Teng et al., 2020).
However, it should be noted that all people from various parts of the
society can be affected by the pandemic. Many employees have to
perform their tasks from home, which is known as remote working,
telecommuting or telework. Remote working requires employees to use
various types of technologies which have not been used previously.
Overreliance on technology can make employees prone to technostress
(Molino et al., 2020). Technostress refers to that kind of stress experi­
enced by an individual as a result of using information and communi­
cation technologies (Molino et al., 2020; Ragu-Nathan et al., 2008). It
was demonstrated by Tarafdar et al. (2007) that technostress is associ­
ated negatively with individual productivity and positively with role
stress. Moreover, remote working can affect work-life balance of em­
ployees. A study showed that the willingness toward teleworking de­
pends on several factors including gender, marital status, and having
children (Zhang et al., 2020). Furthermore, children have to stay home
during the pandemic as kindergartens and schools are closed, raising the
burden of childcare on parents. As a consequence, the risk of parental
burnout and child maltreatment may arise during the pandemic (Grif­
fith, 2020).
Similar to other working populations, academicians are also affected
by the pandemic. As traditional education methods are no more appli­
cable, academicians have to learn new technologies and employ new
training methods. This includes both offline and online training tech­
nologies. Offline training technologies refer to those technologies uti­
lized for recording educational videos and audios which are later
uploaded on a predesigned website to be downloaded and used by stu­
dents. Online technologies refer to those technologies, including both
software and hardware, utilized for online training courses in the shape
of video conference or webinar. Delays in research projects (Ghe­
breyesus, 2020) can be another problem of academicians during the
pandemic. Furthermore, as schools are closed and children have to stay
home, the burden of childcare on academicians who have children may
increase. All these factors can result in psychological fatigue and mental
problems among academicians. Most previous studies focus on the
outcomes of the pandemic on healthcare staff; however, it seems to be
necessary to assess its effects on other working groups such as acade­
micians and university staff. Accordingly, the aim of the present study
was to identify unprecedented problems among academicians (UPPA)
and assess their relationship with perceived fatigue and mental health.
2
Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098
2. Material and methods
2.1. Participants
This cross-sectional study was conducted among nonclinical acade­
micians from Hamadan University of medical sciences during spring
2020. All non-clinical professors were included in the study (204
members). The clinical professors were excluded because they spend
most of their times in hospitals which are totally different from uni­
versities in terms of hazards and unprecedented problems created by the
pandemic.
2.2. Identifying unprecedented problems among academicians (UPPA)
For identifying risk factors of fatigue and mental health among ac­
ademicians, first, a number of participants were interviewed. They were
asked about the main factors influencing their health and fatigue during
the pandemic. The interviews were continued until we perceived that all
factors were extracted and no new information was gained. Next, all
items mentioned by participants were extracted and a list of questions
was provided. A questionnaire was developed based on the extracted
items. The content validity of the questionnaire was investigated using
the content validity ratio (CVR) and content validity index (CVI)
(Lawshe, 1975; Lynn, 1986).
2.3. Fatigue and mental health
Multidimensional fatigue inventory (MFI) (Smets et al., 1995) was
used for measuring fatigue among the participants. MFI is a 20-item tool
measuring five aspects of fatigue, including general fatigue, physical
fatigue, reduced activity, reduced motivation, and mental fatigue. All
items should be answered on a 5-point Likert scale. Each dimension can
have a score between 4 and 20 so that higher scores are indicative of
higher levels of fatigue. Worth mentioning, the questionnaire has been
translated into Persian and widely used among Iranian populations
(Bazazan et al., 2019; Rasoulzadeh et al., 2015).
Mental health status was assessed using 28-item general health
questionnaire (Goldberg and Hillier, 1979). The tool has four subscales,
including somatic symptoms (items 1–7); anxiety/insomnia (items
8–14); social dysfunction (items 15–21), and severe depression (items
22–28) (Goldberg and Hillier, 1979). As each item is answered based on
a scale ranging from zero to three, the score of each subscale falls within
a range from zero to 21. Lower scores of each subscale are indicative of
better mental health status. In this study, scores lower than seven were
regarded as the “mild symptoms”, scores between eight and fourteen
were regarded as “moderate symptoms”, and scores ranging from fifteen
to twenty one were regarded as “severe symptoms”. GHQ-28 is a vali­
dated tool which has been widely used in many populations from all
around the world. The tool was translated into Persian by Besharat
(2009).This validated version was used in this study.
2.4. Data analysis
A variety of statistical tests were used to analyze data collected in this
study. The questionnaire developed based on the items extracted from
interviews with academicians was subjected to exploratory factor
analysis (EFA) in order to determine its main components. Univariate
and multivariate regression analyses were conducted for assessing the
association of various variables (including demographic characteristics
and those created by the pandemic) with fatigue and mental health.
Worth mentioning, the variables with a p value lower than 0.2 in the
univariate analysis were examined again in the multivariate regression
model.
F. Ghasemi et al.
3. Results
3.1. Participants
A total number of 172 academicians from Hamadan University of
medical sciences participated in this study (response rate = 85%). They
were aged between 26 and 63 years old with an average and standard
deviation of 42.45 years and 8.28, respectively. The mean experience of
them was 11.27 years with a standard deviation of 9.42. They were
mostly male (116 participants, 67.4%) and married (143 participants,
83.1%).
3.2. UPPA during the pandemic
In the first part of the study, eight academicians were interviewed in
order to scrutinize main problems they faced during the pandemic. The
UPPA included problems and difficulties in using new technologies
necessary for online/offline remote training, delays in research projects,
concerns regarding the quality of remote training, uncertainties
regarding the graduation of students spending their last semester, con­
cerns regarding the education of their own children, challenges in taking
care of children as schools are closed, new conflicts between family
members, and so on. Based on this set of interviews, nine items were
extracted, shown in Table 1, and based on these items a questionnaire
was developed in which the participants were asked how much they felt
these problems. Each question was answered based on a five-point scale
ranging from not at all (corresponding to score 1) to very high (corre­
sponding to score 5).
Table 2 is the result of EFA performed on these items. As evident, two
components were extracted from the questionnaire. The first component
was associated with educational and research problems and the second
component was associated with family problems created by the
pandemic.
3.3. Regression analyses
Having extracted these two components, the effects of these com­
ponents alongside demographic characteristics of participants on fatigue
and mental health dimensions were investigated using univariate and
multivariate regression analyses.
The results are presented in Tables 3 and 4. As demonstrated in
Table 3, both components of UPPA were not significantly related to
physical fatigue (p > 0.05). In contrast, both these components were
significantly related to mental fatigue among academicians (p < 0.05).
Moreover, UPPA related to the university significantly affected reduced
activity and general fatigue dimensions (p < 0.05). UPPA related to
family also had a significant relationship with the reduced motivation
Table 1
Items identified during interviewing with academicians.
Code Item
c1 Taking care of children (because schools and kindergartens are closed and
children have to stay home)
c2 Delays in performing and completing research projects
c3 The learning and use of technologies required for remote training (both
online and offline)
c4 The reduction in education quality as they should be held in a remote
manner.
c5 Concerns regarding the education quality and educational status of children
c6 Unprecedented conflicts and problems among family members as they have
to spend much more time with each other,
c7 Ambiguity about coming semesters and inability to planning for them.
c8 Unprecedented conflicts and problems about the graduation of students
spending their last semester,
c9 Unprecedented conflicts and problems between students and professors
regarding the ways using which classes should be held (online or offline and
the time of classes).
3
Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098
Table 2
The result of EFA on UPPA during COVID-19 pandemic.
Items Component Variance Cumulative Assigned name
explained variance explained
1 2
C8 0.849 40.00% 40.00% UPPA related
C9 0.844 university
C7 0.834
C2 0.736
C5 0.706
C6 0.607
C3 0.867 23.08% 63.08% UPPA related
C1 0.791 to family
C4 0.780
dimension (p < 0.05). Table 4 demonstrates the relationship of UPPA
components and demographic characteristics of participants with
mental health dimensions. As evident in this table, according to multi­
variate analyses, both UPPA components were significantly associated
with all mental health dimensions (p < 0.05). Among demographic
characteristics, gender was the only with a significant relationship with
the anxiety/insomnia and somatic symptoms dimensions, suggesting
that being female is associated with higher scores of these dimensions.
3.4. Mental health
The overall mental health status of academicians measured by GHQ-
28 is depicted in Fig. 1. As evident, most academicians had a mild status
in terms of somatic symptoms, anxiety/insomnia, and severe depression.
However, most academicians had a moderate status in the social
dysfunction subscale. These findings highlight that social dysfunction
can be the dimension most affected by the pandemic.
4. Discussion
The present study was conducted to identify UPP among academi­
cians from Hamadan University of medical sciences during the COVID-
19 pandemic. After conducting several interviews, developing a ques­
tionnaire, distributing the questionnaire among academicians and col­
lecting the completed ones, and analyzing the collected data, we found
two main categories of problems. The first one was associated with
university issues created by the pandemic. The use of new technologies
of training and uncertainties regarding the new situation and its effect
on education and research activities were the main concerns of acade­
micians. The use of new technologies requires academicians to record
and save the classes. In fact, the recording of classes and uploading them
on a website in a permanent manner frustrated many academicians.
Probable mistakes during teaching and flattering are some important
concerns of academicians when using new training methods. These
problems and difficulties are a type of technostress created by the
pandemic (Molino et al., 2020). Many studies have demonstrated that
technostress may affect more individuals during the pandemic. Christian
et al. (2020) investigated technostress among lecturers from an Indo­
nesian university. According to this study, workload of lecturers
increased as a result of the pandemic. Moreover, some aspects of tech­
nostress can negatively affect the teaching performance of lectures
(Christian et al., 2020). In line with this study, remote working was
introduced by Molino et al. (2020) as an antecedent of technostress
among various working groups during the pandemic. In the same vein,
Zeeshan et al. (2020) found that online training during the pandemic
can impose additional responsibilities on faculty members. Moreover,
the pandemic causes many delays in research projects and most acade­
micians were worried about such delays.
The second category of UPPA identified in this study was related to
the family. As schools are closed during the pandemic, children have to
stay home, increasing the duties of parents in taking care of them. In
such a situation, parental burnout can be expected (Griffith, 2020).
F. Ghasemi et al. Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098

Parental burnout refers to a particular state of mental, physical, and

Univariate and multivariate regression analyses of factors associated with fatigue among academicians (N = 172, variables with a p-value lower than 0.2 in the univariate regression model were examined in the

(− 0.14–0.66)
emotional exhaustion resulted from the excessive childcare burden

Multivariate

(0.44–1.36)
Coefficient
(Roskam et al., 2017, 2018). In an Italian study, it was observed that

(95% CI)

0.90**
17% of participants, especially mothers, suffered from significant

0.26
exhaustion related to parenting duties during the lockdown because of

–
the COVID-19 pandemic (Marchetti et al., 2020). The findings of this
part of the study were in line with other studies carried out in other
General fatigue

(− 1.11–0.76)

(− 0.08–0.03)

(− 0.05–0.04)

(− 0.59–0.32)

(− 0.43–1.88)
Asian countries. A study carried out in China by Wang et al. (2020) and

(0.55–1.43)

(0.09–0.89)
Coefficient
Univariate

(95% CI)
another study carried out in Vietnam by Le et al. (2020) demonstrated

0.99**
− 0.18

− 0.03

− 0.00

− 0.13

0.49*
that having children can be significantly associated with mental health

0.73
issues such as stress, anxiety, and depression symptoms. Moreover, as
demonstrated by Tee et al. (2020), staying home for a prolonged period
of time can be a risk factor of mental disorders.
(− 0.73–0.25)
Multivariate

Mental health, measured by GHQ-28, and fatigue, measured by MFI-

(0.35–1.39)

(0.02–0.92)
Coefficient
(95% CI)

20, were other issues investigated in the present study. Mental health
− 0.24

0.87*

0.47*
has been introduced as a critical issue during the pandemic (Koven,
–

2020; Xiong et al., 2020). Social dysfunction with a mean value of 8.69
was the highest scored dimension of mental health. The result is similar
to that reported by Maciaszek et al. (2020) conducted among medical
Mental fatigue

(− 0.55–1.57)

(− 0.01–0.02)

(− 0.07–0.04)

(− 0.90–0.12)

(− 1.03–1.58)

(0.56–1.56)

(0.26–1.14) and non-medical professionals during the pandemic in Poland. The re­
Coefficient
Univariate

(95% CI)

sults of the present study demonstrated that both components of UPPA

1.06**

0.70**
− 0.04

− 0.01

− 0.39
0.51

0.27

were significantly associated with all mental health dimensions,

including somatic symptoms, anxiety/insomnia, social dysfunction, and
severe depression. The results are in line with those studies reporting
having children as a risk factor for mental disorders during the pandemic
Multivariate

(0.00–0.07)

(0.04–0.63)
Coefficient
(95% CI)

such as (Le et al., 2020; Wang et al., 2020). These components had a
0.04*

0.33*

significant effect on the perceived mental fatigue, whereas, their effects

on physical fatigue were not significant. None of the demographic
–

–
Reduced motivation

characteristics of the participants was significantly associated with

perceived fatigue dimensions. Based on the multivariate analyses,
(− 0.52–0.90)

(− 0.02–0.06)

(− 0.14–0.54)

(− 0.31–1.42)

(− 0.22–0.48)

gender was significantly associated with several mental health di­

(0.01–0.08)

(0.07–0.67)
Coefficient
Univariate

(95% CI)

mensions such as somatic symptoms and anxiety/insomnia. These

0.04*

0.37*

findings, to some extent, are in agreement with previous studies sug­

0.19

0.03

0.20

0.56

0.13

gesting females are more prone to mental disorders (Lim et al., 2018;
Steel et al., 2014).
Worth mentioning, vaccine hesitancy has been introduced as a main
(− 0.63–0.20)
Multivariate

(0.13–0.97)

barrier in the battle against COVID-19 (Dror et al., 2020). According to a

Coefficient
(95% CI)

recent study (Szmyd et al., 2021), mental health of individuals during

− 0.21

0.55*

the pandemic can affect their willingness to get vaccinated against the
–

virus so that people with depression symptoms were less desired to get
vaccinated. However, more researches are needed on this topic.
Reduced activity

Nevertheless, people with mental disorders should be a priority in

(− 1.21–0.51)

(− 0.05–0.04)

(− 0.04–0.05)

(− 0.71–0.13)

(− 1.10–1.03)

(− 0.32–0.42)
(0.16–1.00)
Coefficient
Univariate

receiving vaccines, because these people are more likely to be infected

(95% CI)

0.58**

by COVID-19 and the rates of hospitalization, morbidity, and mortality

− 0.35

− 0.01

− 0.29

− 0.04
0.00

0.05

among them are higher than others (Wang et al., 2021; Warren et al.,
2021).
In comparison with mental health, less attention has been paid to the
Multivariate

fatigue among non-healthcare workers. However, fatigue seems to be an

Coefficient
(95% CI)

important issue during the pandemic. In this regard, a study carried out
by Morgul et al. (2020) among people from Turkey demonstrated that
–

64.1% of participants were psychologically fatigued. In this study, all

dimensions of fatigue were found to have a moderate score, which are
Physical fatigue

not in line with those reported by Morgul et al. (2020). Moreover, ac­
(− 0.60–0.94)

(− 0.05–0.04)

(− 0.04–0.04)

(− 0.41–0.34)

(− 0.28–1.61)

(− 0.16–0.60)

(− 0.21–0.45)

cording to previous studies, fatigue can act as a mediator on the rela­

Coefficient
Univariate

(95% CI)

tionship between life quality and mental health (Bazazan et al., 2019).
− 0.01

− 0.04
multivariate regression model again).

0.17

0.00

0.66

0.22

0.12

For alleviating the consequences of UPPA, the application of Cognitive

Behavior Therapy (CBT) seems to be useful and effective. Using CBT,
individuals will learn to identify and avoid harmful thoughts (Ho et al.,
2020a; Zhang and Ho, 2017). The meta-analysis study carried out by Soh
UPPA related to university

et al. (2020) demonstrated that CBT is very effective in treating

UPPA related to family
(reference: female)

(reference: single)

insomnia. As sleep quality is an important determinant of fatigue

Academic degree

(Ghasemi et al., 2019), it can be concluded that CBT can be effective in

treating fatigue as well.
Experience

Marriage

Finally, this study had some strengths which should be mentioned.

Variable

Gender
Table 3

The study was conducted among academicians, a working group which

Age

has not been extensively investigated. Moreover, this study initially

4
F. Ghasemi et al. Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098

Table 4
Univariate and multivariate regression analyses of factors associated with mental among academicians (N = 172, variables with a p-value lower than 0.2 in the
univariate regression model were examined in the multivariate regression model again).
Variable Somatic symptoms Anxiety/insomnia Social dysfunction Severe depression

Univariate Multivariate Univariate Multivariate Univariate Multivariate Univariate Multivariate

Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient Coefficient

(95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI) (95% CI)

Gender − 1.59** − 1.46* − 1.88* − 1.75** − 0.15 – − 0.43 –

(reference: female) (− 2.79 - -0.39) (− 2.64 - -0.28) (− 3.32 - -0.44) (− 3.06 - -0.43) (− 1.16–0.87) (− 1.56–0.69)
Age − 0.09* − 0.11 − 0.02* − 0.12 0.00 – − 0.08* − 0.59
(− 0.16 - -0.02) (− 0.24–0.01) (− 0.18 - -0.02) (− 0.26–0.02) (− 0.06–0.06) (− 0.14–0.02) (− 0.16–0.04)
Experience − 0.05 0.04 − 0.05 0.04 0.03 – − 0.05 0.08
(− 0.11–0.01) (− 0.07–0.15) (− 0.12–0.02) (− 0.08–0.16) (− 0.02–0.08) (− 0.10–0.01) (− 0.01–0.16)
Academic degree − 0.65* − 0.03 − 0.89* − 0.09 − 0.25 – − 0.69* − 0.20
(− 1.24 - -0.07) (− 0.78–0.72) (− 1.59 - -0.19) (− 0.92–0.74) (− 0.74–0.24) (− 1.23–0.16) (− 0.79–0.40)
Marriage − 0.80 – − 0.95 – 0.67 – − 0.57 –
(reference: single) (− 2.31–0.70) (− 2.75–0.86) (− 0.58–1.91) (− 1.95–0.82)
UPPA related to university 0.88** 0.69* 1.80** 1.41** 1.17** 0.98** 1.22** 0.93**
(0.29–1.47) (0.08–130) (1.13–2.48) (0.73–2.08) (0.70–1.64) (0.49–1.46) (0.70–1.75) (0.44–1.41)
UPPA related to family 0.56* 0.42** 1.30** 0.98** 0.83** 0.59** 0.48 0.55*
(0.04–1.08) (− 0.11–0.94) (0.70–1.90) (0.39–1.56) (0.42–1.25) (0.17–1.01) (0.00–0.95) (0.13–0.97)

Fig. 1. Mental health status of academicians during the COVID-19 pandemic measured with GHQ-28.

interviewed with academicians to explore the unprecedented problems, Abbreviation

so there was no prejudgment regarding the problems of academicians
during the pandemic. The study had several limitations, as well. In this EFA Exploratory Factor Analysis
study, GHQ-28 was used for investigating psychiatric symptoms, hence UPPA unprecedented problems of academicians
the identified symptoms are self-reported and not based on clinical PTSD post trauma stress disorder
diagnosis. The gold standard for establishing psychiatric diagnosis is to CVR content validity ratio
conduct structured clinical interview and functional neuroimaging (Ho CVI content validity index
et al., 2020b; Husain et al., 2020). Furthermore, this study was con­ MFI Multidimensional fatigue inventory
ducted among a limited number of academicians and generalization CBT Cognitive Behavior Therapy
should be made with caution. This study was conducted among acade­
micians, however, the pandemic can affect all other occupations, hence CRediT authorship contribution statement
it is recommended for future studies to explore the emerging problems
and issues in other occupations and assess their undesired consequences. Fakhradin Ghasemi and Seyed Mostafa Hosseini designed the study.
Fakhradin Ghasemi and Rashid Heidarimoghadam collected the data.
5. Conclusion Maryam Zarei and Rashid HeidariMoghdam performed the analysis of
the data. Fakhradin Ghasemi and Seyed Mostafa Hosseini wrote the
The pandemic created new problems for academicians. These prob­ manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
lems can be categorized into main groups; those related to the university
and those related to the family. Conceptually, those problems related to Ethics statement
the university are very close to technostress and those problems related
to the family are very close to parental burnout. Moreover, these prob­ The study protocol was approved by the ethic committee of Hama­
lems could affect the status of fatigue and mental health among them. dan University of Medical Sciences (Ethic code: IR.UMSHA.
Authorities should take actions to remedy these problems. REC.1399.394).

5
F. Ghasemi et al. Gene Reports 23 (2021) 101098

Funding Lim, G.Y., Tam, W.W., Lu, Y., Ho, C.S., Zhang, M.W., Ho, R.C., 2018. “Prevalence of
depression in the community from 30 countries between 1994 and 2014/692/699/
476/1414/692/499 article”, Scientific Reports. Springer US 8 (1), 1–10.
The study was financially supported by Hamadan University of Lynn, M.R., 1986. Determination and Quantification of Content Validity. Lippincott
Medical Sciences. Williams & Wilkins, Nursing Research.
Maciaszek, J., Ciulkowicz, M., Misiak, B., Szczesniak, D., Luc, D., Wieczorek, T., Fila-
Witecka, K., et al. (2020), “Mental health of medical and non-medical professionals
Declaration of competing interest during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic: a cross-sectional nationwide study”,
Journal of Clinical Medicine, Vol. 9 No. 8, p. 2527.
Marchetti, D., Fontanesi, L., Mazza, C., Di Giandomenico, S., Roma, P., Verrocchio, M.C.,
Authors declare no conflict of interest. 2020. Parenting-related exhaustion during the Italian COVID-19 lockdown.
J. Pediatr. Psychol. 45 (10), 1–10.
Marelli, S., Castelnuovo, A., Somma, A., Castronovo, V., Mombelli, S., Bottoni, D.,
Acknowledgement Leitner, C., et al. (2020), “Impact of COVID-19 lockdown on sleep quality in
university students and administration staff”, Journal of Neurology, Springer Berlin
The authors would like to thank Hamadan University of Medical Heidelberg, No. 0123456789, available at:doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s00415-02
0-10056-6.
Sciences for financial supports (grant number: 9905283336). Margaritis, I., Houdart, S., El Ouadrhiri, Y., Bigard, X., Vuillemin, A., Duché, P., 2020.
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