Factors Affecting Stress among International Graduate Students at the Faculty of Sports Science and Technology Bangkokthonburi University

Abstract

Background and Aims: International graduate students of the Faculty of Sports Science and Technology, Bangkokthonburi University, were of interest because they were a group of people who had high academic stress. Some students have responsibilities and have to divide their time to study. They also had to adjust to a new environment in terms of lifestyle, new friends, teaching style, language, and different cultures in Thailand. Therefore, this study aims to 1) study the stress level of international graduate students. 2) to study the factors affecting the stress of international graduate students.

Methodology: This research was a survey research. The sample used in the study was foreign graduate students in the academic year 2024 of the Faculty of Sports Science and Technology, Bangkokthonburi University, totaling 286 people. After collecting the questionnaires, 275 questionnaires were returned, accounting for 96.15 percent. The instruments used were questionnaires consisting of 3 parts: a questionnaire on personal data of the population, a mental health assessment form with a Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.74, and a stress level survey of foreign graduate students, with an IOC of 0.67 and a questionnaire reliability of 0.92. The analysis of stress levels used descriptive statistics, including frequency and percentage, and the analysis of factors affecting stress of foreign graduate students used mean and standard deviation, along with multiple regression analysis.

Results: 1) Most of the international graduate students of the Faculty of Sports Science and Technology, Bangkokthonburi University, had mild stress, totaling 115 people, accounting for 41.82 percent of all respondents. There were 8 students with severe stress, accounting for 2.91 percent of all respondents. 2) From the study of academic factors, social and environmental factors, and relationships with others, it was found that academic factors and social and environmental factors significantly affected stress of international graduate students at a statistical level of .05. Both variables could jointly predict stress of international graduate students by 3.3 percent, with the variable having the highest predictive influence being academic factors, followed by social and environmental factors.

Conclusion: Most of the international graduate students of the Faculty of Sports Science and Technology, Bangkokthonburi University, had mild stress, and the academic factors and social and environmental factors significantly affected the stress of international graduate students.