The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of stress-coping training on the stress-coping skills and state anxiety of elementary schoolers. Two research questions were posed:
1. Does a stress-coping program have any effects on improving the...
The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of stress-coping training on the stress-coping skills and state anxiety of elementary schoolers. Two research questions were posed:
1. Does a stress-coping program have any effects on improving the stress-coping abilities of school children?
2. Does a stress-coping program have any effects on easing the state anxiety of school children?
The subjects in this study were 54 fourth graders selected from an O ementary school located in Seoul. After every child in seven different classes in the elementary school took tests in stress-coping skills and state anxiety, one class was selected as an experimental group, and another class that was equivalent to the experimental group was selected as a control group. There were 27 children in each of the groups. The experimental group participated in a stress-coping program in 10 sessions for five weeks, and no action was taken to the control group. A posttest was carried out to verify the effect of the program after the experiment was finished. SPSS Win Ver. 12.0 program was utilized to analyze the test results. The students were asked to write down how they felt in each session, and a survey was conducted after the program was concluded. Besides, this researcher made an observational analysis, and all the data were analyzed.
The findings of the study were as follows:
First, the experimental group that took part in the stress-coping program showed a more significant improvement in stress-coping ability the control group that didn't when the posttest and follow-up test were implemented. That program had a significant effect on all the components of that group's stress-coping skills, including active coping, pursuit of social support, aggressive coping and passive/avoidant coping.
Second, according to the posttest and follow-up test, there was a more significant reduction in the state anxiety of the experimental group exposed to the stress-coping program than that of the control group. In the posttest, that group underwent significantly favorable changes in school anxiety, presentation anxiety and social anxiety that were the subvariables of state anxiety, but no statistically significant change was found in home anxiety and test anxiety. In the follow-up test, however, there was a significant reduction in all the subvariables of state anxiety that included home anxiety, school anxiety, test anxiety, presentation anxiety and social anxiety.
When their writing and observation data were analyzed to make up for the shortcoming of the tests, it's found that they learned how to handle stress in the right way, and were aware of appropriate stress-coping methods such as relaxation training, assertive training, rational thinking, I-message, and self-instruction training. They learned to apply those methods to real life, and they were able to handle their stress better. Many learned to think rationally by coping with their stress in a different manner, and they came to feel more stable. Their improved stress-coping skills contributed to easing their anxiety as well.
The above-mentioned findings suggested that the stress-coping program had a good effect on boosting the stress-coping skills of the elementary schoolers and mitigating their state anxiety.
In conclusion, this study was meaningful in that it presented how to help school children better respond to their stress in today's stressful society and trained them how to handle anxiety in association with stress as what needed their immediate attention. And the findings of the study proved that stress-coping training could be conducive to children's lives and growth.