Stress Mediates the Relationship between Personality and the Affordance of Socially Distanced Online Education

Damian J Rivers,Zheng Yan

doi:10.1155/2022/9719729

Abstract

The novel coronavirus pandemic has made life significantly more stressful for large populations of people. As one such demographic, university students worldwide have experienced a sudden shift toward the provision of socially distanced online education, often in the absence of a coherent institutional plan. The mechanisms of stress appraisal and response differ between individuals in part determined by personality. With a sample of 293 undergraduate students at a Japanese university operating under prohibitions relating to face-to-face education, this article examines the impact of personality on the affordance of socially distanced online education mediated through generalized life stress and online learning stress appraisal. A retrimmed structural model returned an acceptable goodness of fit accounting for 31.6% of the criterion variance. The model indicates that conscientiousness (positive) and neuroticism (negative) hold a significant mediated impact on the affordance of socially distanced online education through generalized life stress and online learning stress appraisal. Moreover, and in the absence of face-to-face social interaction, the model shows that extroverted students experience greater online learning stress appraisals than neurotic students. Neurotic students were, however, negatively impacted by appraisals of generalized life stress but not online learning stress. Informed by personality characteristics and stress appraisals, the outcomes are discussed in relation to educational improvements and appropriate pedagogies for the delivery of socially distanced online education.

Highlights

The novel coronavirus pandemic has exerted a profound impact on public mental health contributing to an increase in depression, anxiety, insomnia, and stress appraisal [1,2,3,4,5]
Construct validity was affirmed through average variance extracted (AVE) values of >0.50 combined with composite reliability values > 0:70 [103]
As a proactive teacher-researcher response to the dramatic changes experienced surrounding the novel coronavirus pandemic, the current study has focused on the shift toward the provision of socially distanced online education within the context of a Japanese information systems university

Summary

Introduction

The novel coronavirus pandemic has exerted a profound impact on public mental health contributing to an increase in depression, anxiety, insomnia, and stress appraisal [1,2,3,4,5]. The mechanisms of stress appraisal and coping are known to differ significantly between individuals [10] and are at least partially determined by personality [11,12,13]. In a cross-sectional study, one-third of students experienced stress and anxiety relating to pandemic restrictions. In a study of university students in the United States, almost two-thirds of the sample reported increased stress and anxiety during the pandemic while less than half believed they were equipped to cope with the situation [5]. In a study of students from three universities in China, over two-thirds of the population indicated moderate to high-stress levels during the pandemic [50]

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion