South African nursing students' stress and resilience during the global COVID-19 health crisis

Abstract

The study aimed to investigate nursing students' psychological distress and their response to stress during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants were 370 South African nursing students (female= 75%; mean age= 21.9 years, SD = 3.9 years). Students completed the following scales: Compassion Satisfaction and Fatigue, Kessler Psychological Distress, and Response to Stressful Experiences. Findings from the descriptive statistics and inferential statistical analyses indicated that students meeting the criteria for being well were likely to have higher resilience scores. Protective factors such as self-efficacy, active coping, and spirituality suggest higher resilience during COVID-19-related stressful events. Physiological factors such as self-reported medical conditions and lack of sleep were associated with poorer mental well-being. These findings provide a profile of nursing students' coping and adaptation to a community-spread pandemic. From these findings, nursing schools could manage students' well-being by providing needed resources in their current and future work health support programmes.