College students and COVID-19: Psychological well-being and academic performance

Author

Skylar S. Raynor, Campbell UniversityFollow

Volume

28

Number

1

Department

Dept. of Psychology

Publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Place of Publication

Chattanooga (Tenn.)

Date

2022

Abstract

When the United States declared a national emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic on March 13, 2020, many college students were forced out of campus and back to their homes, altering normal routines and academic environments for students. Recent research suggests potential psychological and academic implications from the pandemic on college students. The goal of the current study was to explore overall psychological well-being and changes in academic performance throughout the COVID-19 pandemic in college students. Psychological well-being was defined as an individual’s levels of depressive symptoms, anxiety, and social isolation. 89 undergraduate students at Campbell University were asked to complete an online Qualtrics survey that included the Beck Depression Inventory, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, a revised social isolation questionnaire, and questions about academic performance. Preliminary results supported the hypotheses. 63% of students felt that their academic performance was negatively impacted by the pandemic. Strong positive correlations were found between social isolation and depression (r = .717; p<.001), social isolation and anxiety, (r = .734; p<.001), and depression and anxiety (r = 0.866; p<.001). There was an upward trend of students who felt that their GPA was lower than previous semesters from Spring 2020 to Spring 2021. One-way ANOVA analyses revealed a significant difference between levels of depression and perceived academic impact [F(2,87) = 4.32, p = .016], levels of anxiety and perceived academic impact [F(2,87) = 5.469, p = .006], and social isolation and perceived academic impact [F(2,87) = 4.169, p = .019].

Keyword

COVID-19, depression, anxiety, loneliness, academic performance, college students

Discipline

Psychology

Document Type

article

DCMI Type

Text

Language

English

Rights

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

License

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/

Recommended Citation

Raynor, Skylar S. (2022) "College students and COVID-19: Psychological well-being and academic performance," Modern Psychological Studies: Vol. 28: No. 1, Article 2.
Available at: https://scholar.utc.edu/mps/vol28/iss1/2