1 of 16

Undergraduate Stress Levels in Response to COVID-19

Yasmine Nousari & Julianna Gerold

Research Practicum in Social and Cognitive Methods

Boston College

2 of 16

Background

COVID-19 related university closings resulted in mass displacement of students.

Home life is destabilizing for many students due to inequalities:

Eg. Limited healthcare access, food insecurity, limited WiFi connectivity, etc.

For many students, on-campus learning is vital for career preparedness

Especially STEM majors- clinicals, labs, practicums, etc.

Personal wellbeing is directly tied to academic wellbeing

3 of 16

Research Question

Hypothesis: Higher stress levels will be reported by those with demographic-related disadvantages than those without.
Alternative Hypothesis: Higher stress levels will be reported by those without demographic-related disadvantages.
Null Hypothesis: Reported stress levels are not significantly correlated with demographic disadvantages.

(Hypothesis Logic Statement: If a participant reports demographic-related disadvantages, they are also more likely to report high stress levels. )

4 of 16

Methods

Participants: 41 Boston College undergraduate students

(M=9, F=32) (8 seniors, 26 juniors, 7 sophomores)

Qualtrics survey distributed on social media platforms

Likert Scale format

Participants reported the following:

Current general & academic stress levels
Pre-pandemic general & academic stress levels
Potential stressors amidst COVID-19 situation

5 of 16

Methods (continued)

Comparison of means in the following 2 categories:

Current general/academic stress in pre-professional students & stress levels in non-pre-professional students
Current general/academic stress levels between male & female participants

Independent samples t-tests (two-tailed) were used to compare means in both categories

6 of 16

Results Section:

7 of 16

Statistical Values	Current Academic Stress levels	Current General Stress Levels	Statistical Values	Current Academic Stress levels	Current General Stress Levels
Pre-Professional Mean (SD)	3.7778 (1.39)	4.1111 (0.33)	Male Mean (SD)	2.8889 (1.16)	2.8889 (1.16)
Non Pre-Professional Mean (SD)	3.75 (1)	3.7188 (1.02)	Female Mean (SD)	4.0 (0.95)	4.0625 (0.66)
T(df)	0.06(10.51)	1.85(37.9)	T(df)	-2.62(11.16)	-2.89(9.53)
P- Value (two-tailed)	0.956545	0.072390	P- Value ( two-tailed)	0.023708	0.016182

8 of 16

9 of 16

10 of 16

11 of 16

12 of 16

Variable of interest: Changes in baseline stress

Statistical Values	Academic Stress Levels	General Stress Levels
Before Mean (SD)	3.7073 (1.14)	3.5122 (0.925)
After Mean (SD)	3.7561(1.09)	3.8049 (0.927)
T(df)	-0.2(80)	-2.08(4)
P- Value ( two tailed)	0.8411988	0.043977

13 of 16

14 of 16

15 of 16

Discussion

Implications in a broader context:

Gender parity’s influence in the academic world
Pre-professional students’ applications to post-graduate institutions & future careers

Data from a homogenous population: The “BC bias” and its research limitations

BC students’ data isn’t representative of all college students & is inherently skewed
Further research at public or community colleges could lead to more generalizable results

Implications of results in a broader context: gender parity:

regarding women’s roles in the home in light of the transition to home life, in conjunction to women’s roles in academia/the working world
cite articles on women’s academic conscientiousness, daughter’s household roles with chores and emotional involvement in situations, & that article on comparing publication rates of male and female academics during the pandemic

This doesn’t mean that COVID-19 "hasn’t taken a toll on female authors, though," Dolan and Lawless wrote, as women submitted just eight of the 46 solo-authored papers during this time. That’s 17 percent, compared to 22 percent of solo-authored papers in the larger data set.( The American Journal of Political Science , Co-editors Kathleen Dolan and Jennifer L. Lawless )
https://ajps.org/2020/04/20/it-takes-a-submission-gendered-patterns-in-the-pages-of-ajps/

Implications of results in a broader context: preprofessional students:

A lot of med schools frown upon students choosing/pass fail, or not letting them pass/fail certain courses altogether
Students conducting clinicals and labs online results in students not having hands-on experience vital for careers
Less access to tutoring services and advising
Summer research, shadowing, MCAT/LSAT/GRE prep plans derailed which affect timeline of graduate school.

Talk about why we couldn’t use certain data here:

Explain the BC bias (reference yasmine’s npr article)
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/college-mobility/boston-college: The median family income of a student from Boston College is $194,100, and 70% come from the top 20 percent. About 1.6% of students at Boston College came from a poor family but became a rich adult.
https://www.princetonreview.com/college/boston-college-1023898: Boston College has gotten some flak for its “preppy,” “white,” and “homogenous” student body, and a communication student admits, “The school’s nickname as ‘J. Crew U’ isn’t entirely unwarranted.”
We couldn’t truly ask about wifi stability because we had no other choice but to distribute the survey online
BC students aren’t representative of a realistic population

not every college student has health insurance BUT the majority of BC students do (all our participants did)
A lot of other factors are skewed by this BC bias in a similar fashion:

Gender identity- all our participants were cisgender
Similarly but to a lesser extent, concern regarding access to healthcare needs

16 of 16

Thank you!

Stay well :)