Stressful Points In College Life Essay, Research Paper

Stressful Points in College Life

I. Stress Periods for Students

A. September

1. Periods of homesickness especially for first year students. Students are confronted with conscious over value conflict areas of race, drugs, and alcohol experimentation, morality religion and social expectations.

2. Feelings of inadequacy and inferiority develop because of the discrepancy between high school status and grades and initial college performance.

3. “In Loco Parentis” blues; students feel depressed because of real or perceived restrictive sense of confusion, vulnerability and lack of any advocate in power positions.

B. March

1. Depression begins due to anticipation of separation from friends and loved ones at college

2. Academic pressures increase.

3. Existential crisis for seniors. They become afraid to leave school.

C. May

1. Anxiety develops because of the realization that the year is ending

2. Seniors panic about jobs or the lack thereof.

3. Pressure and anxiety develop over finals.

II. Freshmen, Seniors Hit With Stress

A. College freshmen and seniors-worlds apart in many ways- share an unpleasant phenomenon: Stress. This may be because they both are entering a new and unknown situation or time in their lives.

B. First year Stress Suspense

1. Freshmen often find themselves with responsibility for daily and long term decisions they?ve never faced before.

2. One example would be a young lady who has just started her first year at Washington State University. She says that her first year has been anything but easy. Part of the problem is her hectic overloaded schedule; she doesn?t sleep much and rarely has time for herself. She says “Ever since I started college last fall, my stress level has been rising.

3. Parents usually help but it seems that they are a million miles away. She may be able to talk to her mom like in high school but now her parents are more likely to cause stress than to relieve it.

4. Parents complain about how much it costs to send children to college and plus, they expect the highest grades.

5. As a result of stress, one?s grades may start to slip adding more stress to an already stressful life.

C. The Freshman 15

1. On of the greatest freshman fears is gaining weight or what some call, the “Freshman 15″.

-The stress of handling rigorous studies and being away from parents for the first time, in an environment with unlimited access to food, can quickly result in weight gain. Also if freshmen use food to soothe emotional needs instead of hunger, putting on 15 pounds is quite possible.

D. Senior Stressors

1. For seniors the unknown is life after graduation. While they know the ins and outs of school, they have adjusted to the independence of the college lifestyle. Now they have to face the real world and competition out there in the job market.

2. Senior stresses may include things such as the apprehension of leaving school, the wonder “Is my education worth anything, was my major a mistake, why go on, where is God, and why am I not making it?”

III. The Student Stress Scale

1. The student stress scale represents an adaptation of Holmes and Rahe?s Life Events Scale. It has been modified to apply to college-age adults and should be considered a rough indicator of stress levels and health consequences.

2. People with scores of 300 or higher have a high health risk.

3. Subjects scoring between 150 and 300 points have about a 50-50 chance of serious health change within two years. Subjects scoring below 150 have a 1 in 3 chance of serious health change.