To stress or not to stress?

In the article entitled ‘Academic Stress and Health: Exploring the Moderating Role of
Personality Hardiness’, Hystad et al. (2009) discuss the relationship between students’
personality and their approach towards academia. The authors refer to the multiplicity of
experiences students have during this period, like leaving for the first time their families and
embarking upon academic life. The latter may replace the initial excitement towards university
with anxiety and depression, causing stress and mental wear. The sentiment shared by the
researchers, nonetheless, is that the academic environment is evaluated subjectively by each
student based on his/her own personality. In other words, individual characteristics such as
motivation will dictate how positively a student perceives academia. Hence the authors’
hypothesis that students with a more resilient set of “learned resourcefulness” or “personality
hardiness” (p. 422) would be less impaired by academic demands. To put this hypothesis to the
test, a survey with undergraduate students was conducted. Therefrom it was concluded that
students who demonstrated a more resilient cognitive set were less likely to report mental health
complaints (i.e., stress), but that this characteristic alone did not protect students from tension
and worry and that reporting university-related ailments was still common among students.
The discussion of stress in tertiary education in Hystad and his colleagues’ article brings me the
question of whether universities are intrinsically stressful or not while preparing their students
with skills for academic life. On the one hand, I agree with the scholars that university is a
watershed for young people. It is equally true that students have many expectations towards
university and begin their studies willing to learn and give their best. However, to the best of my
knowledge, many students develop a growing disappointment with university. They drop out due
to feeling that they are not learning or developing skills, but rather losing their time and health.
On the other hand, I have also witnessed a considerable number of students who lack basic skills.
For instance, there are people who cannot deliver a simple presentation or who possess no
critical thinking or have narrow general knowledge. However, I agree with the authors’
statement that a certain cognitive set may help students better deal with academia. Even though
the process of obtaining knowledge is not easy but rather time consuming and mentally
challenging, it does not have to be disappointing and overwhelmingly stressful. Thus, it is of
paramount importance for universities
to better prepare students during their first year and take advantage of their excitement to convert
it into skills for learning instead of ending up with disillusion and stress.

References
Hystad, S. W., Eid, J., Laberg, J. C., Johnsen, B. H., & P. T. Bartone. (2009). “Academic stress
and health: Exploring the moderating role of personality hardiness”, Scandinavian Journal of
Educational Research, 53 (5), 421–429.

Author ideas agree disagree, the way he discusses, personal insights and stories. Thesis makes it
clear what im going to write latter on.