Stress among University Students

“Stress can be regarded as any internal or external factor, which makes adaption to environment difficult” (Pourrajab, Rabbani & Kasmaienezhadfard, 2014). Among the most affected by high levels of stress are university students. University is one of the most important parts in a student’s life and also one of the most memorable ones. It is the final preparatory step of students before reaching adulthood therefore it is accompanied with difficult tasks and duties, important to make them more capable in facing life difficulties. However, this period is accompanied with a great amount of stress. The way students cope with the stressors they face, can make stress a positive or negative influence to their academic performance. This study was made with the purpose of getting a deeper understanding of stressors in a group of university students, how it affects their school performance and how they cope with the stress they face. In doing so it can help in finding how their coping strategies are connected with their school performance and what can be done to reduce stress levels among them.

Literature Review

Previous studies have found connections between stress expressed and gender of the students. A survey was made in various co-education colleges in India with the purpose of identifying levels of stress and coping strategies between both gender students. The initial hypothesis was that it was experienced the same between them but the results showed that female students are more stressed and emotional when dealing with stressful situations (Anbumalar, Jaswanti, Priya & Reniangelin, 2017). However, the study made by Yumba (2008) on a survey among 100 undergraduate students showed there was no significant difference between the levels of stress experienced between genders. According to the study of Abouserie (1994) which studied the main stressors and stress levels among students related to their belief in being able to control their lives, academic stress was the most problematic and female students appeared to have a higher level of stress.

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Stressors such as: oversleeping, financial issues and difficulty in handling many school courses seem to have most of impact on students but they influenced negatively in performance only at the end of the semester at the time of final exams (Rafidah, Azizah, Norzaidi, Chong, Salwani & Noraini, 2009). Other studies find academic factors as the most stressful among university students (Struthers, Perry & Menec, 2000; Somnath, 2014) which will continue to be a problem even in the future (Reddy, Karishmarajanmenon & Anjanathattil, 2018).

When dealing with high levels of stress, students report to use more coping techniques. Avoidance coping techniques which are most used, reported to have a high influence in increasing stress levels (Dwyer & Cummings, 2001). Aldwin, Revenson (1987) reported that there is no consensus among students about the coping strategies which reduce levels of emotional distress so no immediate coping strategy can be found.

Methodology

This study is based on an online survey made in SurveyMonkey.com. It was focused on university students from which there were 75 participants. 52 of which, were female students and 23 were male students. The survey was conducted on the following questions:

1. How much stress do you go through in your daily life? This question was made with the purpose of understanding stress levels among female and male students.
2. What are the main stressors in your daily life?
3. Does the stress you experience influence negatively in your school performance?
4. What techniques do you use to manage stress?

The first questions were multiple-choice, and the last question was open-ended. Since these were open-ended questions, there were many opinions, which I divided into two main categories: positive and negative coping. Coping strategies are used as techniques to reduce distress and tension of people (Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000).

Results

The study found that the level of stress is higher in female students where most experience a lot of stress (38.48%) while most of male students experience just a small amount of stress (56.52%). The main stressor among students is academic stress (48.28%) and the least one was financial stress (4%). 66.6% of the students reported that there was a negative interrelation between stress and their performance and 33.4% responded that it didn’t affect negatively in their performance.

59 students answered the last question about coping strategies. For positive coping the most answers were: talking with friends and family, practicing hobbies and time management through careful planning. Related to the negative coping, most of the answers were: denying the existence of the stressful situation and spending a lot of time in social media. 57.33% of the students who responded were in the positive coping category and 42.67% in the negative one.

Discussion and Conclusions

This was a limited study with the participation of 75 university students so further studies are needed to reach to an accurate and valid conclusion. Many university students are facing stress in their daily lives and the institution plays the major part of it (Saipanish, 2003). Female students are seen to experience stress in a higher level than male students. Having support from the school, family and friends would have a great impact on the performance of students. In that way, students will feel less stressed and aim for higher academic results (Trocket, Barnes, Egge, 2000). Engaging in positive coping techniques might help students to better manage their academic stress (Pariat, Rynjah, Joplin & Kharjana, 2014). By seeing everyday stressors in a more optimistic view rather than as overwhelming struggles, can help in transforming that stress into positive working energy. Since in this study, negative coping strategies were higher among students and stress experienced by them had mostly a negative influence in performance, future studies can focus on finding the best ways to use coping strategies to provide less stress and more performance from students.

References

1. Abouserie, R. (1994). Sources and Levels of Stress in Relation to Locus of Control and Self-Esteem in University Students. Educational Psychology, 14(3), 323-330. Retrieved January 2019, from: http://www.thrivetraining.info/wp-content/uploads/Sources-and-Levels-of-Stress-in-Relation-to-Locus-of-Control-and-Self-Esteem-in-University-Students.pdf
2. Aldwin, C. M., & Revenson, T. A. (1987). Does Coping Help? A Reexamination of the Relation Between Coping and Mental Health. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53(2), 337-348. Retrieved January 2019: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Carolyn_Aldwin/publication/19535402_Does_Coping_Help_A_Reexamination_of_the_Relation_Between_Coping_and_Mental_Health/links/00b7d52f27fcb2c209000000.pdf
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