European Journal of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences

EDUCATIONAL STRESS AMONG THE ADOLESCENTS IN SELECTED SCHOOLS OF KATHMANDU VALLEY

Rachana Pokhrel* and Lal Kumari Gurung

ABSTRACT

Background: Adolescence is a crucial phase in life and the presence of conditions like stress at this stage of life is a matter of concern. Educational stress is a leading cause of anxiety and depression among adolescents.This study aimed to find out the educational stress among adolescents in public and private schools of Kathmandu. Methods: A cross sectional descriptive study design was adopted for this study. Probability cluster sampling technique used for selection of schools. The study samples were 426 students of public and private schools of Kathmandu. Self-administered semi structured questionnaire and rating scale were used for the data collection. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used for data analysis purpose. Results: On an average, majority of the adolescents (79.3%) had moderate educational stress and 10.1% had severe educational stress. Based on type of school, private schools’ students had significantly higher level of educational stress in comparison to public school students. However, public schools’ students had more moderate level of educational stress (80.5%) in comparison to private schools’ adolescents (78.2%). Factors found to be associated with educational stress from multivariate analysis were student’s studying in nine class (AOR=2.140 95% CI: 1.408-3.252), student studying in private school (AOR=2.517 95% CI: 1.540-4.114) and use of internet (AOR=2.490 95% CI: 1.379-4.498). Conclusion: On the basis of these findings it is concluded that educational stress is highly prevalent among adolescents and is high enough in private schools. It should be prevented and identified early, so that they can lead a healthy life and can achieve future goal related to education and career.

Keywords: Adolescent; Educational stress; Public school; Private school.