Stress and coping strategies of college student-athletes

• Main Author: Ines, Jennifer V.
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2021
• Subjects: College athletes—Philippines—Psychology; Adjustment (Psychology); Stress in youth; Personality and Social Contexts; Psychology; Social and Behavioral Sciences; Social Psychology
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/faculty_research/13103
• Institution: De La Salle University

Student-athletes experience enormous amount of stress due to the nature of the roles that they play. Being a student, one has to deal with the demands of academics- attending regular class hours, studying for tests, submitting projects, working together with their groupmates on certain tasks, etc. As an athlete, one also needs to attend to athletic responsibilities such as long hours of training, local and international competitions, etc. Balancing these roles can be quite challenging. Stress, when not managed effectively may result to negative consequences to a person’s physical and mental health. The study sought to shed light on college student-athletes’ unique experiences of coping with the stresses brought about by their dual role of being student and athlete. It aimed to describe the different kinds of stress that student-athletes experience in their daily lives. More importantly, it aimed to investigate on the types of coping mechanisms that student-athletes employ in order to manage their stresses. Findings reveal that stress experienced by athletes come in the forms of interpersonal stress, academics-related, athletics-related and family financial stress. Results also show that athletes employ both vigilant and cognitive avoidance coping in managing their stress.