Intelligence and Academic Stress among Tobacco Users and Non Users College Students

Tobacco problem is a major concern of humanity that has unfortunately not been fully recognized till date. Today the problem of tobacco abuse has assumed a greater significance on account of its proliferation among youth in various socio-cultural and economic strata. This situation has been further complicated due to fast pace social transformation brought in the society by rapid industrialization, urbanization and migration. With materialization, consumerism and individualism going ascendancy, the modern youth is drifting away from his traditional ischolar_mains and is finding it difficult to cope with ever increasing social pressure, which brings in him stress and frustration. Under these conditions, they turn to activities promising relief and thus seek the solace of drugs which enables people to slip away from oppression of reality and find a refuge in a world of their own where painful feelings do not enter.The purpose of the study is to arouse the level of consciousness of clinicians and researchers to the possibility of the non genetic influence in tobacco users and to investigate the causes that are feeling of insecurity, failure, unemployment, parental attitudes, Companionship that can cause stress, anxiety and strain which might make the person prone to tobacco use. (Students above 18 years), 72 tobacco users and 72 non-tobacco users were selected from different colleges in Rajasthan state, India. They were administered the Raven's Progressive Matrices Ravens, (1988) and Academic Stress Scale, Lal, Misra and Pandey (1985). 't' test was used to find out the significant difference in intelligence and stress level between tobacco users and non-users. Intelligence remained to be a non-significant measure in differentiating between Tobacco users and Non-users. Relationship exists between academic stress and intelligence among tobacco users and non users college students. However there is a significant difference in mean scores on stress between users and non users.