Revista Argentina de Clínica Psicológica 2020, Vol. XXIX, N°2, 301-306
DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.240 301
C
ORRELATION BETWEEN
S
PORTS
A
CTIVITIES AND
A
NXIETY
S
TATES OF
C
OLLEGE
S
TUDENTS
Jun Hui
Abstract
Anxiety is detrimental to the school life and mental health of college students. Their psychological anxiety could be relieved through active participation in sports activities. In this paper, a questionnaire survey is carried out in seven colleges in Tianjin and Shijiazhuang, China, using the State Trait-Anxiety Inventory (STAI). Through descriptive analysis, the author evaluated the participation of sports activities and anxiety states of college students, summarized the main problems in these areas, and put forward targeted countermeasures. The results show that most college students have good mental health, but some suffer from anxiety; sports activities suppress the depressive tendency of individuals; on the individual level, the main problems with the participation of sports activities and mental health of college students include insufficient time of exercise, athletic enthusiasm and scientific sports; on the school level, the main problems are the lack of attention, scientific guidance and effective supervision; college students should learn relevant theories and seek psychological guidance in their spare time, while schools should encourage their students to participate in sports activities, offer sports guidance and perform psychological intervention on the students with mental illnesses. This research promotes the participation of college students in sports activities and helps them keep a healthy mind.
Key words: College Students, Sports Activities, Anxiety, Mental Health.
Received: 08-01-19 | Accepted: 19-07-19
INTRODUCTION
As China’s economy and people’s life quality
keep improving, the concept of health has attracted more and more attention, especially in
today’s era when illnesses like depression and
anxiety are so frequent (Pierce, Liaw, Dobell et al., 2010). Mental health has become the focus of people in healthcare (Flett & Hewitt, 2014). As the future and hope of one nation, college students in recent years are showing worrying mental health (Cheng, Hardy, & Markland, 2011). Certain studies have showed that college student anxiety and other mental illnesses are rising year by year (Latinjak, Hatzigeorgiadis, & Zourbanos, 2017). Undesirable mental health
Department of Physical Education, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110819, China.
E-Mail: [email protected]
works negatively on college students’ daily
study, life and social contact, and even leads to their suicide tendency (Verner-Filion, Vallerand, Donahue et al., 2014). How to reduce college anxiety and improve their mental health has become a focus of study at present (Ducrocq, Wilson, Smith et al., 2017). Sports activities can
not only improve one’s physical health (Cangur, Yaman, Ercan et al., 2017), but also enhance mental health greatly (Van de Pol & Kavussanu, 2012). Therefore, participating in sports
activities is an effective way to improve one’s
physical health and prevent mental illnesses (Scott-Hamilton,Schutte, Moyle et al., 2016).
College students are in a transitional life period, which prepares them to enter society
from school. It’s also a key period for their
physical and mental growth with great mental fluctuations (Oudejans,Binsch, & Bakker, 2013). Subject to external interferences, college students suffer from anxiety transformed from
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pressures of employment and study and would easily feel pessimistic (Fink,Fischler, Raschner et al., 2013). Certain studies have proved that
people’s anxiety can effectively be relieved by different kinds of aerobic or anaerobic exercises. For instance, intense aerobic exercises, jogging and other simple sports have been proved to
relieve people’s anxiety, blood pressure and
others (Elliott, Polman, & Taylor, 2014). The analysis of the correlation between college student sport activities and their anxiety has positive impact on relieving their anxiety. So, based on the statistics from 570 questionnaires, this paper analyzes the correlation, and raises countermeasures according to the results, in the hope of providing references for educational departments in dealing with college student anxiety.
CURRENT COLLEGE STUDENT SPORTS
ACTIVITIES AND THEIR ANXIETY STATES
The researcher consulted college teachers, college students, psychologists and management scientists, made references to State Trait-Anxiety Inventory (hereafter referred to as STAI), and formulated a questionnaire on the correlation between college student sports activities and their anxiety. 700 copies of the questionnaire are sent out to 7 colleges in Tianjin and Shijiazhuang, and 653 were withdrawn. 570 are valid, so the return rate reaches 87.29%. The characteristics of the college students interviewed are shown in Tab. 1.
Table 1.
Characteristics of interviewed college
students
Feature Description Quantity
Gender Male 309
Female 261
Grade
Freshman 109
Sophomore 197
Third year in university 175 Fourth grade
university 94
Is it an only child?
Yes 323
No 247
STAI is composed of state anxiety and trait anxiety, respectively rating each question from grade 1 to grade 4. Then the scores of S-AI and T-AI are respectively counted. The final scores, between 20 and 80, are used to identify anxiety
states.
Analysis of Anxiety Characteristics of Interviewed College Students
This study uses STAI to analyze the anxiety characteristics of the college students of different genders, and the results are shown in Tab. 2. It can be seen that there’s a 0.01 difference between the male students and the general population in the state-trait anxiety, which proves that the male students’ anxiety are higher than the general population. So, we should focus on the mental health of the male students to prevent their anxiety and other negative emotions from provoking mental illnesses. Their anxiety might be caused by pressures from study, employment, exams and family. And there’s a 0.05 difference between the interviewed female students and the general population, which might be caused by their sensitivity. This trait would easily give rise to negative emotions in love affairs and interpersonal relationship. Therefore, we should also perform psychological intervention on female students to ensure their mental health.
Table 2.
Results of STAI surveyed by
interviewed college students
Index S-AI T-AI
Male 39.86±7.32 44.06±7.01
Male norm 38.34±9.63 44.43±8.03
P 0.000 0.000
Female 41.55±7.14 45.37±6.97
Female norm 39.07±8.15 45.87±7.65
P 0.000 0.000
CORRELATION BETWEEN SPORTS ACTIVITIES AND ANXIETY STATES OF COLLEGE STUDENTS 303
Meanwhile, the general anxiety states of the interviewed college students are also summarized by the questionnaire (See Figure 1). Of the 570 interviewed students, 83 often feel anxious, 201 occasionally do, 286 seldom or never do. Generally, the anxiety states of the college students are not serious. Most of them have good mental health, but some suffer from anxiety. So proper psychological intervention should be applied to them troubled by anxiety to ensure their mental health.
Investigation of the correlation between the participation of the interviewed college students in sports activities and their anxiety states
This study carries out investigation and summary of the participation of the interviewed college students in sports activities, and the results are shown in Figure 2. It can be seen that of the 570 interviewed college students, 103 often participate in sports activities, 182 occasionally do, 196 seldom do and 89 almost never do. Generally, the participation of the college students in sports activities is not so good, for a majority of the students seldom or never participate. The possible reason for this is that college students enjoy free time, but are not good at disciplining themselves. They have little enthusiasm for sports. So physical education should be enhanced, and the students’
awareness for active participation in sports should be aroused.
Figure 2
.
The situation of college students
carrying out sports
This study places the college students who often do sports and those who occasionally do in one category, and places those who seldom do and those almost never do in one category. Compare the anxiety states of the two categories by STAI, we get the results which are shown in Tab. 3 and Tab. 4.
It can be seen from Tab. 3 that the two anxiety indexes of the male students who participate in sports do not differ greatly from each other, which proves that the college students who often do exercises can effectively control their emotions and maintain good mental health to prevent anxiety. But the male students who don’t do exercises reveal a 0.01 difference in state anxiety and trait anxiety, which proves that the male students who don’t
do exercises would easily suffer from short-term bad emotions. This kind of emotions will induce mental-health related issues and cause anxiety. It can be seen from Tab. 4 that the interviewed
female’s students who participate in sports can maintain good emotions. Doing sports plays a role in suppressing anxiety. But those female students who don’t participate sports activities all show a 0.01 difference in state anxiety and trait anxiety, which proves that this kind of students would easily suffer from bad emotions. Their mental health is in turn affected and anxiety tendency occurs.
Table 3.
Results of the interviewed male STAI
Index S-AI T-AI
Participate in
sports 39.65±6.32 40.62±6.71
Norm 38.34±9.63 44.43±8.03
P 0.072 0.081
Not participating
in sports 41.89±8.71 46.32±6.59
Norm 38.34±9.63 44.43±8.03
P 0.000 0.000
Table 4.
Results of the interviewed female STAI
Index S-AI T-AI
Participate in sports 39.07±6.28 43.57±7.01
Norm 39.43±9.26 46.12±7.92
P 0.076 0.083
Not participating in sports 41.59±8.19 44.28±7.53
Norm 39.43±9.26 46.12±7.91
P 0.000 0.000
Given the above, whether male students or female students show obvious differences in
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state anxiety and trait anxiety before and after they participate in sports. Those who participate obviously have good mental health without prominent anxiety tendency. But those who
don’t participate show obvious anxiety tendency and bad mental health according to the results. So, through the comparison of the two, it’s
proved that sports play a role in suppressing individual depressive tendency.
Summary of Schools’ Incentives Actions
Figure 3
.
Statistics of colleges and
universities motivating students to conduct
sports
Figure 4
.
Statistics of school incentive
behavior
This study checks out whether the schools of the interviewed college students adopt incentives actions to encourage the students to do sports (See Figure 3) and their specific
measures (See Figure 4). The results show that out of the 570 interviewed students, 135 say their schools adopt specific measures to encourage their participation in sports, 308 say their schools encourage their participation, but without specific measures, and still 127 say the schools do not have any measures or they have no idea. Generally, colleges don’t do a good job in their incentives, which makes some students less motivated. This tends to exert negative impact on the students’ physical and mental health. As for the specific incentive measures, 42 say their schools count sports participation as one of the graduation requirements, 68 say their schools grant credits according to one’s sports participation, 7 say the students get scholarship for sports participation and 18 say the students are awarded with certificates of merit. It can be seen that colleges’ incentives mainly centralize in graduation requirements and credits. More measures can be adopted to effectively motivate the students to participate.
MAIN PROBLEMS EXISTING IN COLLEGE STUDENT SPORTS ACTIVITIES AND THEIR MENTAL HEALTH
Figure 5
.
College student participation and their mental health as well as the research resultsMain problem
Personal level
School level
Less exercise time
Lack of athletic enthusiasm
Lack of scientific guidance
Lack of effective incentives Insufficient
attention Sports are not scientific enough
According to the current college student participation and their mental health as well as the research results, this study summarizes the main problems existing when they try to suppress anxiety by doing sports (See Figure 5) at personal level and school level. In terms of the
CORRELATION BETWEEN SPORTS ACTIVITIES AND ANXIETY STATES OF COLLEGE STUDENTS 305
former, there are three problems: less exercise time, lack of athletic enthusiasm and insufficient scientific sports. In terms of the latter, the three problems are insufficient attention, lack of scientific guidance and lack of effective supervision. Optimal paths can be searched according to the two levels incorporating 6 problems to promote college students’ sports participation and help maintain their good mental health.
COUNTERMEASURES AND SUGGESTIONS
According to the actual situation and the problems summarized, this study raises corresponding measures and suggestions directing at students and schools, in the hope of making the students more motivated to do sports and improve their mental health.
(1) Suggestions for students. During college life, students are relatively free to arrange their time, so they should make full use of their spare time to actively do sports; while enhancing their physical health, they can maintain good mental health; they should actively learn about sports theories to do scientific and reasonable exercises to prevent getting hurt; when they feel low and need psychological intervention, they should actively contact teachers and classmates to deal with it. They should maintain good state of mind to prevent extreme ideas.
(2) Suggestions for schools. They should actively guide students to do sports and make them more motivated by combinations of mental and material awards; they should make full use of educational resources and arrange professional teachers to provide scientific guidance to ensure the safety of students doing sports; they should learn more about students and evaluate their mental health. They should perform timely intervention on those with tendency of psychological problems to maintain their good psychological health.
CONCLUSION
Based on the statistics from 570 questionnaires, this study carries out in-depth investigation and analysis of the correlation between college student sports activities and their anxiety states. The conclusions reached are as follows:
(1) Generally, college students’ psychological
anxiety is not serious. Most of them have good mental health, but some suffer from anxiety. The participation of students in sports activities is not so good, for a majority of students seldom or never do sports.
(2) There are obvious differences in state anxiety and trait anxiety of the interviewed students before and after they do sports. Those who do sports obviously have better psychological mental health without prominent depressive tendency. Those who don’t
participate show obvious anxiety tendency, and their mental health is not good.
(3) The main problems of college student sports activities and mental health are summarized at personal level and school level. In terms of the former, there are three problems: less exercise time, lack of athletic enthusiasm and insufficient scientific sports. In terms of the latter, the three problems are insufficient attention, lack of scientific guidance and lack of effective supervision.
(4) The countermeasures and suggestions to the problems are summarized. For students, they should make full use of spare time to actively learn about relevant theories and seek timely psychological guidance. For schools, they should actively guide students to do sports, provide physical education and offer psychological intervention to those troubled by psychological problems.
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