The relationship between perceived stress and parent-adolescent communication: A study on first-year college students from the Philippine Women’s University.

Abstract

The family is one of the most neglected organizations. Indeed, many people and professionals fail to remember that the family is the most basic and the most intimate of all organizations. Just like any organization, different members have different roles in the family, and everybody experience stress; especially the younger members. Adolescent students experience a lot of changes. A change of social system leads them to experience stress; and one of these major changes is a student’s transition to college. Aside from the expected stress from academic work, a first-year college student also experiences extra stress from acculturation, this involves the need for internal adjustments and change. One way students cope with the stress they experience in school is to communicate; and this happens very often in their homes, with their parents. Though many books and researches have discussed that communication is a buffer for stress, very few have discussed the effects of stress in the student’s behavior in his or her first organization, the family. This study attempts to discover and describe the relationship between stress and parent-adolescent communication among first-year students. Data were gathered through survey questionnaires and were analyzed accordingly. The research findings suggest that there is no significant relationship between perceived stress and parent-adolescent communication, however, the demographic information helped discover some significant relationships. Hopefully, this study will lead the way for a deeper concern for first-year college students, the changes and stresses they went through, and for a healthier relationship between academes and the families of its students.