2.1 Study design and sampling
A cross-sectional study was conducted over two months starting in
February 2021. The target population was adults living in the UAE who
had access to social media platforms. Adults who were clinically
diagnosed with depression were excluded from the study. English or
Arabic proficiency was also necessary to ensure proper comprehension of
the questionnaire. Nonprobability volunteer sampling was employed to
ensure complete autonomy on the self-administered
questionnaire.2.2 Study tool
The scale utilized for this study was the Center for Epidemiological
Studies Depression (CES-D; CESD, 2021), which measures depressive
symptoms among participants. The instrument contained 20 items that
rated the frequency of experiencing symptoms associated with depression
over the past week, namely, decreased appetite, loss of interest, and
disordered sleep. For each item, the response could range from 0 to 3 (0
= rarely or none of the time, 1 = some or little of the time, 2 =
moderately or much of the time, 3 = most or almost all the time). The
final score was a continuous scale that could span from 0 to 60, with
higher scores indicating frequent depressive symptoms. The CES-D also
provided cutoff scores that aided in identifying individuals at risk for
clinical depression. The tool has already been validated in several
studies and was reliably used in this study to diagnose depressive
symptoms .