Stress, Resilience, and Achievement Motivation in College Students : the Full Half of the Glass

Abstract

The scope of this study was limited to students at Eastern Washington University who chose to participate. The purpose was to examine the relationship between stress, resilience, and achievement motivation in relation to family structure and racial/ethnic status. Participants answered five separate measures, one measure for stress, one measure for resilience, two measures of achievement motivation, and a general information form. A sample of 186 students volunteered to participate. Independent sample T tests and an Anova were used to examine stress, resilience, and achievement motivation in relation to the home environment, racial/ethnic status, and the home environment. In addition to T tests, Pearson correlations were used to examine the associations amongst the family structure for under-represented students.Findings and Conclusions: There was a positive relationship between achievement motivation and self-reported levels of GPA in regard to the intact home and racial/ethnic status. There was not a relation between resilience, stress, and achieving tendency in regards to the intact home and racial and ethnic status. Furthermore, there was a negative relationship between racial/ethnic status and cumulative GPA's.