Stress. En kvalitativ studie om hur elever i årskurs 3 på gymnasiet upplever samt hanterar stress i sina liv

ABSTRACT Author: Therese Larsson Title: Stress. How students in third grade of high school experience and cope with stress in their daily life, a qualitative study. (translated title) Supervisor: Carina Tigervall Assessor: Kristina Göransson The purpose of this study was to examine, through a qualitative approach, how students in third grade of high school experience and cope with stress in their daily life. My purpose was to examine this by looking at if there are some differences in what girls and boys experience. My questions was: In which situations can girls and boys experience stress, does girls and boys experience that stress has a influence on their health and does girls and boys experience that they can cope with stressful situations. I have by looking at previous research found that stress is a problem and that young people tend to be more stressful today then before. Stress has a negative influence on young peoples health and is therefore a significant subject to study. The study was based on focus group interviews. I had four focus groups with four students in each group in two different municipalities. Both female and male students participated. I have in my analys described stress under different headlines. I used my questions to describe my interview persons answer. The analys was based on four different theories: gender, coping, KASAM and demand-control model. The main results of the study are that school, spare time and future experienced as stressful by the interview persons. There were som differences in what girls and boys experienced as stressful in the different situations. Girls experience that school and spare time is very stressful. Boys experience school as stressful sometimes. Boys doesn´t feel that their spare time is stressful. Some of the interview persons experienced future as stressful and some didn´t. The girls also experience that the stress has a negative effect on their health more then boys does. The study also shows that there is some differences in how girls and boys cope with stress. Key words: focus group, stress, high school students, coping, gende