Investigating the Relationship between Competitive Anxiety and Academic Motivation with Mental Health in Students

Success and progress in learning is the goal of all educational systems and the degree of benefit from educational environments requires students' sense of energy and mental health. One of the most important variables in the health of the educational context of any country's educational system is mental health, which is an internal sense to ensure mental health, and in fact, researchers have called it a useful and simple way to understand the concept of students' well-being. In their daily academic life, students face various challenges, obstacles, and special pressures during their studies, which are a threat to their self-confidence, motivation, and, as a result, their academic performance. Some students are successful in dealing with them and others are not successful in this field. Therefore, educational researchers should pay serious attention to understanding and how to adapt to academic challenges. Mental Health Mental health is an issue beyond the absence or absence of mental illness. The positive dimension of mental health, which the World Health Organization relies on, is included in the definition of health: "Health is a state of physical, mental and social well-being, not just the absence of disease or disability". Therefore, mental health is a state of well-being in which a person recognizes his abilities and can adapt to the normal stresses of life and be useful and productive in terms of work. Competitive anxiety and academic motivation can be mentioned among the factors affecting mental health. Anxiety, as a negative feeling, affects a person's perception and leads to a decrease in performance. Of course, many students experience anxiety. Competitive anxiety is an issue that almost every student faces from time to time. When the demands on a student exceed their perceived ability, their stress level rises. Motivation is the most important condition for learning. Interest in learning is the product of factors related to a student's personality and ability, task characteristics, incentives, and other environmental factors. What factors make students' motivation (due to its long-term effects on learning and self-fertility in students) valuable for parents and teachers? Motivated students are easily identified. They are eager to learn, interested, curious, hardworking, and serious. These students easily overcome obstacles and problems, spend more time studying and completing school assignments, learn more, and continue their education after finishing high school. Motivation can be seen as an intervening process with an internal state of an organism that forces or motivates it to act, in other words, it can be said that motivation is a force that gives force to behavior and guides it. Slow and is an effective factor in mental health. Like other topics, there has been a lot of research on the relationship between competitive anxiety, academic motivation, and mental health, but there is no integrated research among school students. Considering the review of past research and the understanding of the relationship between research variables, the lack of integrated research in this field, as well as the importance of competitive anxiety and academic motivation and mental health, the research question of the current research is whether there is a relationship between competitive anxiety and motivation. Is there a relationship between education and mental health in students?

The present research is descriptive and correlational in terms of method, and its statistical population included all male student in the second year of high school in Marivan city who were studying in the academic year 2021-2022. The statistical population was 850 people according to the inquiry from the Statistics Unit of the Sanandaj Education Department. According to the table of Karjesi and Morgan, 265 people were selected through a simple random sampling method. Research tools included three competitive anxiety of Besharat et al. (2021), Harter's academic motivation (1981), and Goldberg's mental health (1972). Pearson's statistical method was used for data analysis.

The research results showed that there is a negative and significant relationship between the components of competitive anxiety and mental health in students, while there is a positive and significant relationship between the components of academic motivation and mental health in gifted students.

In general, it can be concluded that there is a significant relationship between competitive anxiety and academic motivation with mental health, so there is a need for planners and education managers to increase mental health in students, competitive anxiety and academic motivation. Pay attention the current research, like any other research, has limitations that can clarify the findings and suggestions of the research and help future researchers to adopt effective measures to deal with the threat of internal and external validity of research projects. to give The basic limitations of the current research are as follows: the bias of people towards answering the questions of the questionnaires, which reduces the accuracy of the results to some extent, the presence of unwanted variables that affect the results of the research, and the lack of use of other research tools such as observation and interview. It has been associated with the subjects and only using the questionnaire. It is recommended to educational managers to take appropriate motivational measures such as innovation and creativity in creating a competitive and encouraging educational environment with appropriate and up-to-date educational facilities, suitable educational buildings, and preparing students as best as possible for their future jobs. , make regular visits and scientific trips, and use teachers with high scientific knowledge and skills. It is suggested that the scientific and academic interests and tastes of the students be identified and these interests come to the fore through centers, associations, and scientific organizations. Providing a suitable atmosphere in terms of group work, creating innovation in teaching methods, using sincere and friendly spoken literature, and using students in teaching discussions are among the things that can be done by teachers in order to increase the academic motivation of students.