Stress Profile of Secretarial Administration Students in Nigeria

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to investigate the relationship of some demographic variables to the experience of stress among trainee secretaries. Additionally, the prevalence and sources of stress among trainee secretaries were studied. Four hypotheses and two research questions were formulated for investigation. The study was a descriptive survey and employed the Student Stress Inventory developed by the researchers to garner the relevant data. A total of 100 participants (35 males and 65 females) drawn from the Department of Secretarial Studies, The Polytechnic, Calabar - Nigeria took part in the study. The respondents were drawn from all the grade levels of
the ND and HND programmes and were aged between seventeen and thirty-five with a mean age of 24.6years. Results following the analysis of data indicate significant differences in stress levels among Secretarial Administration students due to gender and pre-training experience. Females seemed to experience more stress than their
male counterparts while those with the relevant pre-training experience reported less stress than those without the relevant pre-training experience. However, stress among trainee secretaries was independent of their age and marital status. About 64% of the
respondents found training for secretaryship as either extremely stressful or stressful. The major sources of stress to trainee secretaries were examination syllabuses too demanding in some courses and too much academic assignment to do each day while
the least sources were campus living conditions, overcrowding in hostels and the consequences of engaging in too much social activities to the detriment of school work. Based on these findings some recommendations were made