Psychological impact of dental aesthetics for Kurdish young adults seeking orthodontic treatment

Abstract EN

Background: The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between Kurdish orthodontic patients’ severity of malocclusion and their social and psychological impact.

Materials and method : the sample consists of 100 patients, 45 males and 55 females, aged 13–22 years.

A translated pre-tested questionnaire [psychosocial impact of dental aesthetics questionnaire PIDAQ] was used to assess the subjects’ social and psychological impact by their occlusal irregularities.

The actual severity of malocclusion was determined, using the dental aesthetic index (DAI) on 100 stone study models.

Statistical analysis was carried out, using chi-square test for assessing the associations, and person correlation coefficient was used for assessing correlations.

Analysis of co-variance (ANCOVA) and multiple regression tests were also carried out to complete the statistical analysis.

Results : results of the multiple regression analysis showed that not only DAI score were significantly associated with higher score of PIADQ scores, but other factors, like gender was a significant variable in predicting the psychosocial impact of dental esthetics.

However, age was not significantly associated with PIADQ scores.

The value of R² is equal to 0 .226.

Accordingly, there is a significant weak positive correlation between DAI score and PIADQ scale of the study sample at p < 0.005.