Coping with college : a study of entering freshmen

Includes bibliographical references (pages 54-57)A study was conducted which followed a group of freshmen as they progressed through their first semester of college. The purpose was to study their adjustment to this naturally occurring stressful situation from the point of view which holds that stress is neither a stimulus nor a response, but rather a transactional process between an individual and the environment. Ninety-eight freshmen, ages 17-19, filled out a series of questionnaires during the third week of their first semester of college and again ten weeks later. These questionnaires assessed the student???s level of trait anxiety, their need for autonomy, achievement and change, their perceived hassles and up-lifts, coping strategy (emotion and problem focused coping), feelings of self esteem, and their feelings of psychological well-being. Students??? first semester grade point averages (GPA) were obtained following the close of the semester. It was predicted that the students??? adjustment to college, defined as feelings of well-being and self esteem, could be predicted from the scores on the other variables. At Time 1 the only significant predictor of self esteem and well-being was trait anxiety, which was negatively correlated to both outcome measures. At Time 2 trait anxiety was still inversely related to self esteem, with the Uplifts score significantly related in a positive direction. The only significant predictor of well-being at Time 2 was the negatively correlated emotion focused coping score. The students??? GPA could not be predicted from these variables after partialling out the variance accounted for by their high school grades. The only significant change on these measures from Time 1 to Time 2 was a drop in the Uplifts score. Starting college was apparently not particularly stressful for this sample. Nevertheless, changes over time could be seen in the relative importance of the different elements in the stressful transaction, thus lending support to the use of a transactional, process oriented approach to the study of psychological stress