An Investigation of the Correlation among Sources of Stress, Perceived Stress, and Coping styles in High School Students

Coping with stress is an important issue, especially in regard to source of stress and perceived stress in adolescence period. In this research, the correlation among stress sources, perceived stress, and coping styles was investigated in high school students.
The present research was a descriptive correlational study. The research sample consisted of 575 high school students from the families of personnel of Bushehr University of Medical Sciences in education year 2014-15 who were selected by multistage cluster sampling method. Stress source scale, perceived stress scale and Tehran coping styles scale, were used for data collection. The data were analyzed using statistical methods, including Pearson correlation coefficient and multivariate regression analysis.
In this study, 50% of students had perceived stress higher than cut-off point. Stress sources of students were related to school and maturity. There was a positive correlation between problem-oriented coping style and perceived stress, and there was a negative and inverse correlation between problem-oriented coping style and stress related to school and maturity. There was a positive correlation between positive emotion-oriented coping style and perceived stress, but there was a negative and inverse correlation between problem-oriented coping style and stress related to school and maturity. There was no significant correlation between emotion-oriented coping style and stress related to school, maturity, family, and peers. There was a positive correlation between negative emotion-oriented coping style and stress related to school, maturity, and peers.
According to the findings of this study, the level of correlation was not significant and no significant relationship could be found between the variables with this level of correlation. Therefore, it is suggested that more extensive researches be conducted on the relationship between these variables.