Examination of the Relationship between Stress Coping and Personality for University Students

Abstract

In Japan, 50% of the population is notably stressed, which is expressed as the phrase "stress society". Prevention and care for stressful situations through stress management are social issues for Japanese society. It is important to understand individual psychological traits for dealing with individual stress. Therefore, this study conducted a survey on college students to clarify relationships between their personalities and types of stress coping based on La-zarus's theory. The participants were asked to answer questionnaires about their personalities (TEG II and Big Five) and types of stress coping (SCI). Based on the answers about stress coping, they were divided into emotional or cognitive strategy dominant groups. A canonical correlation analysis was performed scores of the questionnaires in order to quantify the relationships between their personality traits and types of stress coping. The results of the analysis showed that specific personalities had relations to types of stress coping. In addition, there were different relationships between personality and stress coping depending on whether the participants were in the emotional or cognitive strategy dominant groups.