projimo chap 1

comments
1. ” It is true that if people especially students are more educated about the concept of stress and more knowledge of stress management strategies will enable individuals to better cope with the stress and pressure of living in today’s modern society. (faulty)
2. The researcher chose this research topic in order to know what causes stress and what the effective ways to combat stress are. The researcher chose this specific topic (repeated)

Chapter I
INTRODUCTION

Rationale of the Study

The youthful generation of the world today are driven to excel in the different fields that they are interested in. College students are expected to be more serious in their studies than during their primary and elementary education years. Their tertiary education is crucial for them since it determines the course of their future. College is the transitional phase which prepares the student to the harsh realities of the independent life of an adult.
College students experience a lot of significant life events that become learning experiences for them. Somehow these life events have an effect on the students especially with regards to their academic performance. These life events could be factors that trigger stress. A very high number of college students admit that they experience stressful events while trying to comply with various demands from the school and the society.
According to Anstead (2009), “stress is inevitable but knowledge of effective stress management strategies may serve to empower individuals.” It is true that if people especially students are more educated about the concept of stress and more knowledge of stress management strategies will enable individuals to better cope with the stress and pressure of living in today’s modern society.
There is a growing need for awareness of stress and its effects. Certain factors that lead to stress should be considered in order to derive effective stress management practices. The inability to cope with stress will lead to various problems that would eventually affect one's health.
The experience of stress is not a surprise to anyone who goes to college. Once students enter college, they will experience a lot of events that would be stressful for them. Particularly, first year college students who have yet to taste what real college life is, are put to the challenge of discovering the essence of college. They will discover that college is not the same as high school and that college is harder and probable more serious than ever before.
First year students, commonly known as freshmen students, need to understand the importance of stress management since college life is really prone to experiences of stress. As freshmen learn to overcome the challenges of a new and different phase of their life, it is quite inevitable to control some events that will happen thus, they will experience stress.
Stress according to Donkin (1989), is a person’s “physical and emotional reaction to change.” The changes that a first year student encounters upon entering college are many like having to make new friends and familiarizing the new environment plus having to keep up with school activities and lessons in class. These changes could trigger stress for the student.
According to Campbell, Svenson and Jarvis (1992), “studies have shown that when stress becomes excessive, it can affect both health and academic performance” (as cited in Anstead, 2009). This shows that there is a need for students to be aware of the effects of stress and be able to evaluate their selves considering the different practices of stress management that they have applied. Students would not want to become ill or to have low grades in their subjects. It is really important to understand how stress affects them and their academic performance.
There is a need to be able to understand the harmful effects of stress and how these affect the academic performance of students. Conducting this study will give an opportunity to avoid stress and its effects. Stress management is vital at this stage. It will help students to keep stress in check in order to be still able to work efficiently. It is necessary to be attuned with the needs of the students to apply proper stress management in order to perform well in their academics.
The researcher chose this research topic in order to know what causes stress and what the effective ways to combat stress are. The researcher chose this specific topic because she always experiences stress and she wants to lessen and avoid experiencing stress as much as possible. In line with the research, the researcher seeks to understand stress and make it a basis to improve her lifestyle and stress management pratices. The researcher observed that most students claim to be stressed with various life events especially when it comes to school work and requirements. Some students’ academic performance seems to have been greatly affected by their experience to stress. This topic was chosen in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the currently applied stress management practices of the first year students.

Statement of the Problem

The study aims to evaluate the Stress Management Practices of the First Year Students of the UPCC. Specifically, the researcher aims to address the following objectives:
1. To discover how the student knows that he/she is stressed out,
2. To know what are the causes of stress,
3. To know how often stress is experienced,
4. To know how the student manages stress,
5. To know the effectiveness of the student’s ways of managing stress,
6. To know if the student was able to perform well in class,
7. To know if the stress management practices of the student improved his/her academic performance.

Significance of the Study

In the fulfilment of this study, several of people will benefit from the findings and conclusions of this study, especially the students, teachers, family members and those who are experiencing stress.
This research study will help the students know the effectiveness of their applied stress management practices in relation to their academic performance. They would know that their perspective of stress would affect their stress management. The students would also know if their ways of coping with stress is beneficial to them or not.
The teachers would be more considerate of students’ conditions with regards to factors that could cause chronic stress. Teachers would also be able to reflect on their stress management practices and come up with ways to keep the experience of stress at an optimum level for themselves and their students.
Furthermore, this study will inform the family members of students and probably teachers too about how stress can affect the performance of the students and teachers. The family members would also be informed that they can be stressors that could lead the student or teacher to experience stress.
Lastly, the findings of this study can help others who are experiencing stress to evaluate themselves and their ways in coping with stress. This study will enable them to understand more the circumstances of stress and be able to come up with effective practices that would be beneficial to them and to their work.