Risk and protective factors for anxiety impacting academic performance in post-secondary students

Abstract

This survey study measured the association between risk and protective factors of anxiety and its implications on the academic performance of 1,053 students at a four-year, public post-secondary institution in southwestern Ontario. Logistic regression analyses revealed 13 significant variables at the univariable level, while the multivariable model yielded seven significant factors. Students who felt hopeless significantly increased their odds of reporting anxiety adversely affecting their academic performance, while being able to manage daily responsibilities was the only protective factor against anxiety impacting students’ educational attainment. By planning, designing, and implementing proactive programs focusing on thesepredictor variables, such interventions can equip students against the debilitative influence of anxiety on their academic success.

Exploration of Factors Affecting Post-Secondary Students’ Stress and Academic Success: Application of the Socio-Ecological Model for Health Promotion

“…There were minor differences among student and on-campus service provider participants' responses, where both groups largely identified the same factors at each socioecological model level. This finding supports the growing literature recognizing the integral role of post-secondary institutions in fostering students' optimal mental wellness and learning [16,38]. Both groups of participants indicated that undergraduate students typically seek services reactively to address their mental health concerns once they are already stressed, indicating a gap in proactive, resilience-focused, upstream efforts at post-secondary institutions to prevent the deleterious effects of stress from initially occurring.…”

“…Canadian post-secondary institutions are increasingly committed to enhancing students' mental health and academic success through services and programming [16][17][18][19]. However, Linden and Stuart's [20] work argues that there is a limited understanding of the specific evolving sources of stress experienced by Canadian post-secondary students.…”

An Examination of Student Success within Canadian Higher Education: Fifty Years of Findings and Recommendations for the Future

“…Also, an area that could benefit from further research and that is underrepresented within the CJHE is insights into the various psychological and psycho-social factors that affect student success (Lisnyj et al, 2020;Ramey et al, 2018;Wasylkiw et al, 2020). Such studies present a unique and quantitative perspective into the complexities of some predictive factors of student success.…”

“…Such studies present a unique and quantitative perspective into the complexities of some predictive factors of student success. These authors examined numerous factors that may predict student success, such as perseverance and maternal education (Ramey et al, 2018), contributors to anxiety (Lisnyj et al, 2020), and self-esteem, self-compassion, self-efficacy, and participants' mindsets of their own abilities (Wasylkiw et al, 2020). These studies are all newly published and further studies within the field of the predictive validity of psychological outcomes in academic success would likely be a welcome addition to the student success literature within the CJHE and the broader field of higher education.…”

“…Also, with the diversity present within Canada and many other societies, we may argue that addressing social inequality through access to higher education and supporting subsections that are underrepresented is a key metric to gauge success (Michalski et al, 2017). In order to achieve any of the aforementioned goals, we need to understand a wide range of psychological factors that could affect success such as self-esteem, anxiety, and depression (Lisnyj et al, 2020;Wasylkiw et al, 2020), personality factors such as the Big Five (Trapmann et al, 2007;Ziegler et al, 2010), cognitive predictors such as IQ (Sternberg et al, 2001), and various other psycho-social factors such as parental education, identity, and perseverance (Ramey et al, 2018). Lastly, we need tools to measure the knowledge, skills, and competencies of students to ascertain if the system is functioning as intended (Blömeke et al, 2013;Coetzee, 2014).…”