Experienced Stressors and Coping Strategies among Nursing Students-A Correlation with State Anxiety

Introduction

Anxiety has a huge impact on learning. Stress in nursing and in nursing students is a well documented phenomenon, but the extent to which it occurs and means of coping with it vary. The objective of this investigation was to identify stressors, coping styles and finding relationship to state anxiety in nursing students.

Material and Methods-

A descriptive survey was conducted to enrolled 199 nursing students through simple random sampling (lottery method) and total enumeration technique. The principal measures of the anxiety, stress and coping styles were; The State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) for state anxiety, Perceived Stress Scale -14 (PSS-14) for stress, and Adolescent Coping Orientation for Problem Experiences (ACOPE) for coping styles. Data were analyzed by using descriptive and inferential statistics.

Results-

'Remaining upset' (55.3%) marked highest among the stressors in nursing students followed by 'unable to cope stress' (49.2%) and feeling that things are going away (48.2%). The most common coping strategies were listening radio or music (47.7%), taking help of rabbi or priest (53.3%), and talking to father about our problems (36.7%). The least common coping styles were use of beer-wine (7.5%), smoking (7%) and use of prescribed drugs (4%). Stress and anxiety have weak negative correlation (r=-.131, p<.05).

Conclusion -

Although small sample was the limitation of this study yet it implicate the nursing institute teachers as well as students to aware stress management strategies (i.e. using active coping and avoiding self blame)that may help to prevent deadly consequences of anxiety and stress on physical and mental health on nursing students.