Supervisors info:
Άκης (Θεόδωρος) Γιοβαζολιάς, Καθηγητής Συμβουλευτικής Ψυχολογίας, Τμήμα Ψυχολογίας, Πανεπιστήμιο Κρήτης
Summary:
The COVID-19 Pandemic, which violently intruded on the global population’s lives,
combined with the rapid imposition of the restrictive measures and the uncertainty about the nature of SARS-CoV-2 virus, has dramatically affected the daily life of the population. Actually, the student population constitutes an extremely vulnerable group, which was asked to quickly adapt to the new measures and the difficulties, resulting from them. The purpose of this research is to investigate the effective coping strategies adopted by the student population, in order to cope with challenges, such as the Fear of COVID-19, in combination with the investigation of the importance of the satisfaction deriving from the support network and simultaneously highlighting the benefits of Post-Traumatic Growth that stem from the long-term experience of a traumatic situation. The sample consists of 229 undergraduate students, who study in Greek Universities, aged 18-27. The present study is cross-sectional and quantitative. Data were collected by administering self-report questionnaires that assessed Fear of COVID-19, Satisfaction of Support Network, Coping Strategies with Stressful Situations, and Posttraumatic Growth. The statistical processing and data analysis were done using the statistical program SPSSv.21 and The Process macro for SPSS for the analysis of mediation relationships (Hayes, 2013). Based on the findings, it appears that women experience a higher level of Fear of COVID-19 compared to men, while at the same time they exhibit a higher level of Posttraumatic Growth. Finally, it is worth mentioning two important research hypotheses, which were confirmed and concern the mediating role of seeking social support and separately of problem solving in the relationship between Fear of COVID-19 and Posttraumatic Growth, which leads to a higher experience of Posttraumatic Growth.
Keywords:
COVID-19 Pandemic, University students, Fear of COVID-19, Posttraumatic Growth, Coping Strategies, Satisfaction of the support network
