Coping style and psychological adaptation of college students

Hongyu ZHANG; Wenfeng WEI

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND:

At present, it is affirmed that coping style is the important mediator between stress and health both on mental and body. The coping theory is descripted as three orientations trait view, contextual view and interaction person-environment view. The conception and classification of the coping styles still remains to be explored.

OBJECTIVE:

To probe into the dimensions of coping styles, the characteristics of different coping styles and the correlation between coping styles and psychological adaptation among college students.DESTGN Questionnaire investigation.

SETTING:

School of Psychology, Beijing Normal University.

PARTICIPANTS:

Altogether 343 college students were randomly chosen from Tianjin University, Tianjin University of Commerce, Tianjin Normal University and Tianjin University of Finance and Economics. The college students, including 161 males and 182 females, were aged (19±2) years, ranging from 19 to 22 years. According to body health examniation records of them, all the college students had no serious chronic or acute illness. Written informed consents were obtained from all the college students.

METHODS:

The college students were measured collectively in their own classroom respectively from September to December in 1999. There were totally 16 class units. Altogether 422 copies of questionnaire files were sent out. Each copy includes Coping Styles Scales, Adolescent Psychological Adaptation Scales, and SCL-90.The questionnaires were collected once the college students completed. Copying styles were assessed with Coping Style Scale revised by Liang Baoyong, which includes 20 items. Each item gives one kind of coping strategies in daily life. For example, "To tell myself,my trouble is nothing matter When comparing with others, it is no worthy to be annoyant". The college students should be asked to answer on the 5-point Likert scale. These 20 items covered majority of coping styles which were used by adolescents. Two indexes were used as the results of psychological adaptation one is Adolescent Psychological Adaptation Scale developed by Chen Huichang, including 20 items. Scores were collected on the 5-point Likert scale in which high scores mean better adaptation. Another result variable is the amount of SCL-90. High scores mean more symptoms with mental or physical state which stands for lower adaptation level. All the assessment data were input into Foxbase data-base, then were analyzed using factor analysis and cluster analysis in order to attain different kinds of college students coping styles. Correlation analysis was used to examine the correlation between coping style and adaptation. MAIN OUTCOME

MEASURES:

Coping styles of college students and correlation between different coping styles and adaptation results.

RESULTS:

A total of 422 copies of questionnaires were sent out, and 362 copies were drawn back, 19 copies were invalid questionnaires due to either there were missing answers or the answer had reflective tendency. At last, 343 sets of data entered the analysis procedure. ① According to factor analysis results, the main coping styles used by college students were F1 (seeking support), F2(positive thinking), F3(cognitive adjustment), F4(passive blame oneself), F5(facing reality), F6(avoidance), F7(emotional catharsis).There were three main coping styles from cluster analysis, that was, A (positive confrontation), B (passive avoidance) and C(passive catharsis).② Those who were more adaptive used A coping style more frequently, and those who had lower adaptation level used B or C coping style more frequently. But few students used C coping style. A coping style was significantly negatively correlated with mental or physical symptoms (r= -0.258,P＜ 0.01 ),but significantly positively correlated with adaptation level (r =0.467, P ＜ 0.01);But both B and C coping styles were significantly positively correlated with mental or physical symptoms (r=0.338, 0.364, P ＜ 0.01 ), B coping style was significantly negatively correlated with psychological adaptation(r =-0.140, P ＜ 0.05). It seemed that C coping style had no correlation with long-term adaptation. A and C coping styles were two dependent styles respectively. In addition, different levels of stress were significantly correlated with three styles. Few A coping styles were used under high level of stress, but more B and C coping styles did.

CONCLUSION:

Coping style is complex. Use of different copying styles is significantly correlated with psychological adaptation levels. But the direction of correlation is effected by the factors, such as individuals, index of results and degree of stress.