ANXIETY AND COPING MECHANISMS AMONG UNIVERSITY STUDENTS DURING THE COVID-19 LOCKDOWN

ABSTRACT

The outbreak of COVID-19 and the resulting lockdown had a great psychological impact on the lives ofpeople in general and on the lives ofstudents in particular. The current study aims to find the level of anxiety and the types of coping mechanisms utilized by university students during the lockdown period. Furthermore, the relationship between these two variables is also addressed. The participants of this study consist of 260 university students. Hopkins Symptoms Checklist and the Coping Strategies Inventory are the instruments that were used as measurement tools. The results showed that university students have probable anxiety, and their most commonly used coping mechanism is social withdrawal. The study also found a statistically significant correlation between social withdrawal, problem avoidance, and expression of emotion with anxiety. According to the findings, there exists a significant difference in anxiety between male and female students. In addition, a significant difference in the use of coping mechanisms among female and male students existed in the use of social withdrawal and expression emotion coping mechanisms, which were both used more by female students. The findings of this study highlight the need for psychological services to be available in the universities of the region.