TITLE:
Coping Strategies as Predictors of Anxiety: Exploring Positive Experience of Chinese University in Health Education in COVID-19 Pandemic
AUTHORS:
Yue Li, Jun Peng
KEYWORDS:
Coping Strategy, Anxiety, Predictor, Experience, Chinese University Students, COVID-19 Pandemic, Health Education
JOURNAL NAME:
Creative Education,
Vol.11 No.5,
May
15,
2020
ABSTRACT: Background: It is urgent to identify the effective measures to
cope with the psychological stress triggered by the precipitate coronavirus
disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Objective: The present study aimed at examining the levels and links of the anxiety and coping strategies, and then exploring
the coping predictors in anxiety in the
crisis. Methods: An online survey was conducted using stratified random sampling method among 2640 Chinese
university students from 21 February to 24 February 2020. The students’ anxiety
and coping strategies were measured by the Self-Rating
Anxiety Scale (SAS) and the Coping
Strategy Questionnaire (CSQ), respectively. Results: The students
expressed high levels of coping strategies and comparatively low level of
anxiety. Multiple stepwise regression
analysis showed that cognitive coping, emotional coping, and social
support had a significantly negative predictive effect on anxiety, social support being the most powerful
predictor, whereas behavioral coping predicted anxiety positively. Conclusion: The findings suggest that the enhancement of cognitive coping, emotional
coping, and social support should be highlighted and the potentially destructive
impact of behavioral coping is noteworthy, and the pedagogical implications in
health education are hereby addressed.