Relationship between Academic Stress and Ment...

Relationship between Academic Stress and Mental Health among Adolescent Students of Green Valley Educational Institute, Ellahi Bagh, Soura, Srinagar Jammu and Kashmir

Author Name : Shabana Batool, Perkash Kour, Mohammad Ayoub Dar, Rouhi Mehraj, Romana Yousuf, Roomesa Manzoor

ABSTRACT

Background: Academic stress is defined as a demand related to academics that tax or exceed the available resources (external or internal) as cognitively comprehended by the student involved¹. According to WHO mental health is viewed as “a state of wellbeing in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with normal stresses of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community”².

Objectives: The objectives of the study were to assess the academic stress and mental health among adolescent students, find the association of their academic stress and mental health scores with selected demographic variables, and to find the correlation the between academic stress and mental health

Methodology: A quantitative research approach with descriptive correlational design was used. 100 adolescent students were selected by stratified simple random sampling. Assessment of academic stress was done using Academic stress scale by Balaji Rao (2012) and Mental Health Battery by Arun Kumar Singh and Alpana Sen Gupta (2002) respectively.

Results: The overall mean academic stress score and mental health scores were 61.66 ±25.63 and 77.75±9.40. Maximum of the students (57%) were in the range of low academic stress. Majority of the students (80%) were in the range of excellent mental health. There was a significant negative relationship between academic stress score and mental health scores (r= -0.422) at p≤ 0.05 level of significance. It was observed that gender and educational status of mother were significantly associated with academic stress, while no significant association was found between mental health and socio-demographic variables of the adolescent students.

Conclusion: the current study reveals that there is significant negative correlation between the academic stress scores and mental health of adolescents. This emphasizes the need for stress management interventions for students, so that they can have good mental health and be able to deal academic stress effectively.

Keywords: Adolescents, academic stress, and mental health.