PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS OF QUALITY OF LIFE AMONG BOARDING STUDENTS: MODERATING ROLE OF COPING STRATEGIES
Keywords:
Separation Anxiety, Academic Stress, Loneliness, Quality Of Life, Coping StrategiesAbstract
The present study aimed to find out the relationship between separation anxiety, academic stress, loneliness, quality of life and coping strategies among boarding students. A sample of 300 boarding students were selected from different areas of Lahore through convenient sampling technique based on cross-sectional research design. Separation Anxiety Scale by Manicavasagar et al. (2003), Academic Stress Scale by Rao (2012) Loneliness Scale by Russell et al. (1978), Quality of Life Scale by Burckhardt and Anderson (2003) and Coping Scale by Hamby et al. (2013) were used for data collection in current research. The SPSS 23 was used for data analysis. Results revealed that academic stress and loneliness are strongly correlated under the influence of separation anxiety and therefore students who have increased separation anxiety also develop stress and they are lonelier. There is also a high positive relationship with the academic stress and loneliness. Separation anxiety, academic stress, and loneliness, on the other hand, rank among the strongest negative predictors of quality of life and coping strategies, indicating that the more distress one is, the worse of well-being and less resilient the coping. The coping strategies are also related positively to quality of life, meaning that students who have a better life satisfaction are likely to apply more effective coping strategies. Results revealed that coping strategies did not moderate the relationship between separation anxiety, academic stress, loneliness and quality of life among boarding students. The results indicated that male and female boarding students have no significant difference in separation anxiety, academic stress, loneliness and quality of life as the effect sizes are very small. Nonetheless, males rated much higher in coping techniques than females implying that they have better coping techniques or apply them more frequently. All in all, there is a small difference between genders except on coping strategies.
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