Academic Stress and Coping Mechanism among LIS students during the COVID-19 Pandemic – Route to Resilience and Recuperation

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic is considered as one of the most extraordinary disruptions, lifechanging situations that had taken the entire world to an uninterrupted standstill in 2020. The pandemic had brought radically transformed the functioning of the universities globally. In India, sudden lockdown caused a move from the physical classroom to virtual learning, affecting academic stress, anxiety, fear, helplessness, and life quality among university students. A total number of 212 students of library and information science from various universities in Haryana enrolled in the study. The cross-sectional study examines the student's socio-demographic data, attitudes towards academic stress, and adopting various coping strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic. The data of 193 (91.04%) were analyzed using quantitative and qualitative methods. Nevertheless the study limitation, findings provided relevant data of academic stress and online education experience of the students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Students utilized various coping strategies to cope with academic stress to maintain life quality. Furthermore, university students are satisfied with the measure adopted by the Government to mitigate the risk of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study also suggested a plan to design of online learning structure, students' well-being, online stress management programs, and training of effective coping mechanisms that would support alleviating academic stress during a worldwide pandemic.