Descriptive study on gender differences in academic stress derived from the COVID-19 context in a Spanish university population

Abstract

Currently, the health crisis resulting from the appearance of COVID-19 has had a significant impact on the lives of the population, which has undergone many changes in a very short space of time. University students are one of the populations that have had to adapt the most to this pandemic context, which may have generated new stressful situations, affecting their mental health.Therefore, the main objective of this study was to analyse the levels of academic stress in this population, as well as to identify the main stressors, symptomatology associated with stress and the coping strategies adopted by each gender.The total study sample consisted of 351 university students (211 women) who were provided with the Systemic Cognitive Inventory for the Study of Academic Stress (SISCO) adapted to the context of the crisis by COVID-19.The results showed significant differences in stress levels and stress-related variables between men and women, with female students showing higher levels of stress (t(260.077)=-4.801, p£0.01, r=0.29). In addition, differences were also found between in the election of the coping strategies used by men and women. In conclusion, the results of the present study showed statistically significant differences between the stress levels of university students depending on their gender. Furthermore, the main stressors, stress-associated symptomatology and coping strategies adopted by each gender were identified.