Essay Sample on Stress and Coping

Introduction

Students usually experience intense pressure during or before examinations. During the tests, everyone is determined and ready to score high marks in the exams. As a result, students experience this extreme for fear of failure as well as the completion which is part of the students' lives. Preparing for exams in itself is a stressful experience since students are unaware of the areas or the type of questions that will be included in the exam papers. This pressure causes them to complain about mental and physical issues during this period. Students all over the world experience this problem and it may have a profound effect on students later in life.

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Examination period is usually a stressful encounter for me. However, most of this stress can be linked with the fear of the unknown. In most cases, I prepare early for the final and midterm examinations to ensure that I do not get caught up in the last minute rush to the libraries. However, as the exams near, I usually feel "blank" as if I have not studied for the entire semester. The feeling usually fades aware after the start of the exam, and by the end of the exams, it's like it never happened.

Exam situations usually bring various psychological, emotional, behavioral, and cognitive reactions. Some of the responses that I have to the exam stress include increased worry, altered sleep patterns, irregular eating habits, frequent panic attacks, and tiredness. Stress and anxiety usually during the periods where I study for the exams in the last minute. Lack of sleep while studying for the exams increases my stress levels and in most cases affect my performance levels in that particular exam.

Other changes that demonstrate my levels of stress during the exams include increased heart rates. A sense of guilt usually comes to me during this time hence making me unable to relax. Exam stress at times causes a migraine which makes it difficult for me to concentrate and study as expected (Jamieson 580). These unpleasant changes affect my overall performance in either a positive or negative way. In some cases, I can go an extra mile to attempt some questions that I never thought I could try. However, sometimes the stress causes me to answer some of the things that I have learned wrongly due to that intense pressure.

Examinations can in some cases viewed as a pointless endeavor. However, I have learned multiple coping strategies to reduce the exam stress to appropriate levels. The problem-focused and emotion-focused strategies are the best approaches that I use to deal with this stress (Yalcin 9). One of the strategies I apply exercising before exams and engaging in physical activities such as swimming and jogging. I also use distract strategies to manage my stressful encounters during exams. The approach entails the use of stress balls, fidget toys, and some chew gums. I also apply relaxation techniques to reduce exam stress such as taking breathing exercises to confront my fears.

My personality type also plays a critical role in helping me cope with exam stress. Type C personality has some qualities such as consistency, deep thinker, and detail oriented which assist in coping with the stress. This personality type enables me to generate positive thoughts to combat the negative thoughts as well as saying cheerleading statements that help me to cope with the stress effectively.

Works Cited

Jamieson, Jeremy P., et al. "Reappraising stress arousal improves performance and reduces evaluation anxiety in classroom exam situations." Social Psychological and Personality Science 7.6 (2016): 579-587.

Yalcin, Bektas Murat, et al. "The effect of a stress and anxiety coping programme on objective structured clinical exam performance in medical students, a randomised clinical trial." Educational Psychology (2015): 1-14.