The Relationship of Stress and Sleep Quality amongst Cognitive Science Students

Abstract

Stress is a common problem in modern life. Most Malaysian students suffer from high stress levels and poor sleep quality without realising their harmfulness to health and well-being. The major focus of the paper is to examine the relationship between stress and sleep quality among Cognitive Science undergraduate students. This paper also investigates if demographic attributes (gender differences and year of study) affect stress level and sleep quality. The participants of this study comprised 90 Cognitive Science undergraduate students studying at the Universiti Malaysia Sarawak. Data was collected by using the Perceived Stress Questionnaire (Perceived Stress Scale) and Sleep Quality Questionnaire (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index). The results of the study showed that there was a weak relationship between stress and sleep quality. Those in the poor sleep category reported higher levels of perceived stress. Moreover, the findings showed that female students had higher stress levels than male students. First year students appeared to experience poorer sleep quality compared to final year students. The study also found no interaction effects between gender and year of study on sleep quality and stress. Further research could be conducted with a bigger population size and in other study programs. Future research could also assess non-demographic factors which might influence stress and sleep quality.