Stress and Anxiety Essay

Abstract

This study scrutinizes the relationship between stress and anxiety among college students. In the study, we tested and explored the relationship that exists in the students' levels of anxiety, and stress with the elements of the working hours among immigrantsimmigrants students and nonimmigrant students. The study was conducted among 67 undergraduate psychology students from Florida Atlantic University, with an average of 23.39 years. The members were requested to complete forms related to the study, such as their age, GPA, place of birth, and working hours. These were completed in a classroom setting and results were used for the study. The three hypotheses that were considered for the study included: It was predicted that there would be a difference between immigrants and nonimmigrant studies in total USQ score and state anxiety score, with immigrants reporting considerably higher scores in stress and anxiety, also higher working hours would predict higher stress and anxiety, and both anxiety scores and stress levels were predicted to be positively associated with each other. However, after an examination of the hypothesis of the study, we were able to establish that the levels of the college student’s anxiety and stress were not significantly related to immigration and working hours for this sample. The findings have the implication that stress and anxiety among college students are not influenced by the factor of working hours and the place of origin and therefore influence the way others manage their stress elements. In conclusion, from the study, stress and anxiety have no significant relationship.

The Effects of Stress and Anxiety on College Students

There are several reasons for strain for college students; these range from occupied thought-provoking academic courses and opposite agendas. While it is considered facing stress as a student is standard, around are ways of managing anxiety in college and elsewhere. Around twenty percent of people in the USA have a psychological disease that has been or can be identified. Sadness and anxiety are the greatest mutual types of cerebral illness (Julian, 2011). Many students with depression also have a concern and vice versa. Stress and anxiety are more dominant among college students compared to the whole population. Many universities and colleges have, therefore, implemented counseling programs on their campuses that are intended to help address and battle the psychological issues of their students.

In a report by Karpinski (2014), the driver was rechristened 'Students Chances, Resources, and Encouragement.' This program was, however, created to provide an atmosphere where students could converse about the problems they are experiencing and accept community provision as well as connect them with incomes to help them overcome their difficulties. According to Julian (2011), the direct impact involved in totally deteriorating the anxiety problem can significantly influence college pupils' academic lives and even additional parts of their lives.

Little research has been done to study the effect of communal provision for those students with stress and anxiety on their educational presentation. This study combined three theories that travel the association amid state anxiety, trait anxiety, and university. The main objective here is also to determine or recognize the amount to which anxiety affects students' educational accomplishment and the universal life as well as to request and carry measures to offset the effects of prevailing anxiety in college undergraduates. This study aims at examining the impact of stress and anxiety on college students. The study will investigate various factors of stress and nervousness among students such as immigration and working hours

The study seeks to explore the cause of stress and anxiety among college students. There are plentiful sources of stress for college students; these range from employed finished thought-provoking moot sequences and complementary calendars (Julian, 2011). A significant number of college students recommended this program and could self-disclose that they have symptoms of stress and anxiety. According to the survey by Endler and Kocovski, (2001) frequently, these college students do struggle with low-class attendance, lack of focus, and difficulty in taking tests. Endler and Kocovski (2001), define stress as any petition positioned on your intellect or corporeal figure while nervousness is a sensitivity of fear, apprehension, or restlessness. Our study will test three significant hypotheses. While it is considered experiencing stress as a student is normal, there are ways of managing the stress in college and beyond. Mental health issues seemingly affect many students across the country. These challenges are not new and have been on for a long time despite the awareness that exists globally. The theoretical implication of the study is to inform various theories of stress and anxiety management. According to the study, it aims at looking at its manifestation and its factors. Research that involves community sustenance as it relates to their academic accomplishment in college students is quite limited. It examines the theoretical aspect of stress among young people and, most notably, college students. Independent variable; The study's independent variables were working hours and immigration hours. The dependent variable; will be stress and anxiety levels measured by USQ and STAI. The study-dependent variables will be the factors that cause stress and anxiety. These include, “higher working hours and immigration”

The three hypotheses included: it was predicted that there would be a difference between immigrants and nonimmigrant studies in total USQ score and state anxiety score, with immigrants reporting considerably advanced cuts in stress and anxiety, also higher working hours foretold higher stress and anxiety, and both anxiety scores and stress levels were predicted to be positively associated with each other.

Method

Participants

The study sample entailed a total of 67 participants. The members were undergraduate psychology students from Florida Atlantic University, with a usual of 23.39 years. The age range for the selected population of students was between 18 -and 35 of the sampled population, 9 were male, while 58 of the participants were female. The professor recruited the participants for the study for their enrollment in the same Research method undergraduate course. All participants were awarded course credit for their contribution to the education. Out of the participants who belonged to the sophomore class, 28 of the participants were in the junior class, and 38 of the participants were in the senior class education levels. 52 out of the 67 participants in the study were born in the USA. 15 out of the 67 members of the study were born elsewhere outside of the USA. On the other hand, 56 out of the 67 participants of the study indicated that they were employed at the time of the study and did work for more than the recommended 8 hours a day. 10 out of the 67 participants had no job as they were not employed at the time of the survey, with an average of 30.64 (SD=15.15) hours per week. As an ethical measure, the participants were treated anonymously and were given the opportunity of opting out of the study at any point of the study (Julian, 2011).

Measures

State-Trait Anxiety Questionnaire (STAI) (Kumaraswamy et al., (2013), and they filled out the inventory paper that was then given over to the instructor. The questionnaire had 20 questions with a Likert scale for each item ranging from 1-4, where 1 represented the lowest score and 4 represented the highest score. The lowest score indicated the least level of stress and the highest score the highest level of score. The level of anxiety was calculated using the average from each questionnaire score in terms of STAI. The total anxiety score was calculated by adding up all items and average scores across participants. This the student filled on an individual basis. The questionnaire basically had questions regarding the duration that the participants were working in a day and the element of immigration. For this study, however, the primary focus was the experimenter and the subject of interaction. The experimenter interviewed the issues of the topics listed above (working hours, immigrant status, and state anxiety score).

Undergraduate Stress Questionnaire (USQ) We measured stress using the USQ (reference, Crandall, Preisler, and Aussprung, 1992), -this was calculated by adding all the items and average items scores across the participants. The reliability and validity of the instrument used were also tested.

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Procedure

The students filled out the questionnaire in the classroom setting which was administered by their professor. Consent and debriefing were not needed for this study. Each student, as well as the author (L.Z.), took part in the survey as an experimenter and as a participant. The students were first administered the general Basic Information Questionnaire on paper for them to fill out by hand; this removed note of their data concerning the respondent's age, level of education, whether employee, their GPA, and the country where they were born. They were asked if they were employed and also asked to indicate how many hours they worked in a day and what their ages were. This was then followed by an STAI questionnaire and the USQ, which measured their stress and anxiety levels. The independent variable was immigrants and nonimmigrants, as well as working hours, and the dependent variable was anxiety status and stress level as measured by the STAI and USQ.

Results

The analysis of the data for the study focused on stress and anxiety for undergraduates. Each hypothesis was tested, and the results were presented on whether the hypothesis was to be supported or rejected. The calculation of the score for each hypothesis was conducted based on the STAI score and the USQ score as the dependent variables. For hypothesis one, two independent samples t-tests examined the difference between the immigrants and the nonimmigrant students (IV: immigrant students) in stress (DV: USQ total score) and the level of anxiety (DV: STAI overall score). For the second hypothesis, two linear regressions aimed at examining if higher working hours (IV) predicted higher stress (DV) scores and higher anxiety (DV) scores. Lastly, for hypothesis three, a correlation between the STAI Score and the USQ score was performed.

The average score of USQ nonimmigrants was 31.06 (SD =10.94) as shown in table 1, and the USQ average of immigrants was 26.86 (SD = 14.72). The STAI average score for the nonimmigrant score was 40.74 (SD = 10.84) and the STAI mean for the immigrant, was 38.80 SD=8.02. There was no significant difference between immigrants and nonimmigrants in stress and anxiety with STAI T=.64, p=.524, and the USQ t (62) =1.18, p=.245. For the second hypothesis, we conducted two linear regressions to examine if higher working hours predicted higher stress scores and higher anxiety scores. Working hours did not significantly predict the level of stress and anxiety among the students.

The average score of USQ nonimmigrants was 31.06 (SD =10.94), and USQ immigrant was 26.86 (SD = 14.72). The state of anxiety and level of stress were not significantly predicted by working hours based on the linear regressions for the second hypothesis. Besides, the working hours did not significantly predict anxiety among students. There was no significant correlation between anxiety score and stress levels indicating that those with a higher level of anxiety did not necessarily have higher levels of stress as well. The results from the regression analysis for STAI and USQ were 40.74 (SD = 10.84) and 31.06 (SD =10.94).

Discussion

The main aim of the study is to analyze the impacts of Stress and Anxiety on College Students. The study proposed a total of three hypotheses to investigate this topic of study. The first hypothesis did state that It was predicted that there would be a difference between immigrants and nonimmigrants studies in total USQ score and state anxiety score after examination results from this hypothesis test, we can see that there exists no substantial change between the immigrants and the nonimmigrant students (IV: immigrant students) in stress (DV: USQ total score) and the anxiety (DV: STAI total score). This is in line with the study conducted by Diekhoff et al., (2013) which states that stress and anxiety among immigrants and nonimmigrant is all the same and does not depend on the element of whether one was in a given location or is an immigrant to those particular areas. The levels of anxiety and stress among students are affected by factors other than the elements of immigration, such as the psychological state of the student, the family background, and other factors such as mental status (Diekhoff et al., 2013).

On the second hypothesis, which states that higher working hours predicted higher stress and anxiety, the linear regulation did find that working hours did not significantly predict the level of stress and anxiety among the students. This is in line with the previous study by Kumaraswamy et al (2013), which was able to establish that the stress levels and the levels of anxiety and stress depend on the aspect of psychological, economic, and other related factors other than the duration of work. According to the previous study, stress and anxiety were not affected by the level of the student’s working hours. The levels of stress and anxiety remained fairly insignificantly affected by the aspect of the psychological status of an individual and not the working hours.

Based on the third hypothesis of the study, there was no significant correlation between anxiety score and stress levels and this indicates that those with a higher level of anxiety did not necessarily have higher levels of stress as well. The finding from the hypothesis is in line with the vital model by (Endler and Kocovski, 2001). A feature of trait character for anxiety is often stuck by demanding scenarios that result in a correspondence that provokes an upsurge in the state of the anxiety. The model of state and trait anxiety is not related to the elements of stress. The STAI has, in the past, indicated that there is poor visibility in distinguishing parts between persons with and deprived of the aspect of anxiety disorder, which is not in any way rated to the element of stress (Kumaraswamy et al., 2013).

Despite the massive success of the study, it had few limitations. One, the study was limited to the elements of time as a resource. The study was also limited in the aspect of scope as the scope only considers stress and anxiety among students and not the general population. Another limitation that was associated with the study would be the sample size. The study sample size was considerably small in comparison to how many students were considered to the whole population in the institution.

The current study has specifically focused on the element of stress and anxiety among college students. However, the study provides a future direction as it opens the study to the key issues that influence stress and levels of anxiety among people. There is a need for future studies to focus on the sources of stress and anxiety but on the general population other than students. Besides, the future study should examine other factors other than the aspect of working hours and origin. It will also use a considerably large sample size and employ the use of more than two measures as in the situation of the current study.

In conclusion, stress and anxiety among college students are not a factor of working hours and the element of the place of origin (immigrants and non-immigrants). Therefore other factors affect the anxiety and stress levels among students. In the future, there is a need for a more balanced sample and more measures of stress and anxiety levels. Some of the key factors that influence the levels of stress and anxiety include the psychological condition of individuals. Such mental status of an individual such as anxiety disorder affects the individual’s levels of anxiety and stress levels in addition to external factors such as immigration and working hours.

References

1. American Psychological Association. (2003). Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct. American Psychologists, 57(12), 1060-1073.
2. Crandall, C. S., Preisler, J. J., and Aussprung, J. (1992). Measuring life event stress in the lives of college students: The Undergraduate Stress Questionnaire (USQ). Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 15(6), 627-662.
3. Endler, N. S., and Kocovski, N. L. (2001). State and Trait Anxiety Revisited. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 15, 235-245.
4. Julian, L. J. (2011). Measures of Anxiety. Arthritis Care Res (Hoboken), 63, 0-11.
5. Kumaraswamy, N. (2013). Academic Stress, Anxiety, and Depression among College Students Brief Review. International Review of Social Sciences and Humanities, 5(1), 135-143.
6. Lepp, A., Barkley, J. E., and Karpinski, A. C. (2014). The relationship between cell phone use, academic performance, anxiety, and satisfaction with life in college students. Computers in Human Behavior, 31, 343-350. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2013.10.049
7. Mounsey, R., Vandehey, M. A., and Diekhoff, G. M. (2013). Working and non-working university students: anxiety, depression, and grade point average. College Student Journal, 47(2), 379-390.
8. Range, L. M. (2013). 'State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI).' In Psychology and Mental Health (Online Edition).