Developing Resilience: Experiencing and Managing Stress in a US Undergraduate Construction Program
Publication: Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice
Volume 145, Issue 2
Abstract
College students in the US are facing increased levels of stress as they progress through their undergraduate programs. Although these trends are of concern within higher education, they are not likely to change as students pursuing construction-related careers enter into industry. However, resilience and the processes associated with its development have proven useful for both academic success and professional development. In this study, the authors capitalize on undergraduate education as a prominent site for resilience development. In particular, the contexts in which students experienced stress and employed tactics for stress management at a large land-grant university in the US were explored. Upon qualitatively analyzing 20 semistructured interviews with undergraduate students enrolled in building construction and related majors, the authors identified three contexts in and five tactics by which students experienced and managed stress during their undergraduate careers. These findings may inform academic and career advising and support practices to better aim students toward resilience development and career success.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the undergraduate researchers who assisted in data collection and initiated the analysis for this study: Caroline Beuth, Alberto Duran, Caitie Holliday, and Nhi Ly. Your insights and experiences greatly enhanced the quality of this paper and data analysis. The authors would like to gratefully acknowledge the National Science Foundation for its support of this work under the CAREER Grant No. EEC-1351156. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
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Published In
Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice
Volume 145 • Issue 2 • April 2019
Copyright
©2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 30, 2018
Accepted: Sep 19, 2018
Published online: Jan 28, 2019
Published in print: Apr 1, 2019
Discussion open until: Jun 28, 2019
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