Coping with Academic Pressure (for Adolescents)

Each age group has its beauty and challenges. In the case of adolescent years, which is a beautiful transitioning stage, it has numerous changes and challenges occurring for the individuals belonging in this group. With right guidance and encouragement children belonging to this age group can navigate their path smoothly into adulthood. A lot of changes happen, whether they are physiological or psychological, if the individual have already been taught to be deal with then these changes does not affect negatively to them.

With these ongoing changes, there comes a shift in academics as well. Where the students at this stage, receive a syllabus which is little bit more complicated than their previous years. Though the syllabus has been designed in such a way that students don’t feel a sudden pressure over them. But not being able to cope up with recurrent changes in the academic field may lead to development of stress or students might feel pressurized in that area.

Academic pressure is the tension or stress developed by the emotions caused by the pressure from school, parents or society in process of learning. This pressure may start at a very early stage where parents or the care-givers may start to push students for studying harder and continuously excelling at the co-curricular activities. A little pressure is required for the students to excel in the studies or activities at school but when this stress exceed the threshold point of the student to tolerate this external load then they might reach stage of burn-out and collapse. This collapse could lead to maladaptive behavior, or the student might indulge in substance abuse.

Following are the effects of academic pressure on the students:

1.     Having constant anxiety.
2.     Feeling compulsion to work continuously or they will fall back.
3.    Having difficulty in sleeping.
4.    Not being able to relax.
5.   There is a sudden in change in appetite, either they start to eat excessively or there is loss of appetite.
6.   No mood to socialize or meet people.
7.   Increase in competitiveness.
8.  Obsession for getting good grades.

The above-mentioned points can be caused due to many factors. Some of the factors are mentioned below:

1.        When there is an unexpected amount of pressure from parents or guardians. Though this pressure is well intentioned but not being able to understand the amount of pressure required for each situation could create academic pressure for the student.
2.        When the course becomes too stressful for the students. Difficult assignments or examinations could create academic pressure for the students.
3.        When the students are not able to handle pressure due to lack of time management and poor organizational skills.
4.        Students now a days have created a certain benchmark for themselves. If they are not able to achieve that goal, they think themselves as losers. In order to achieve that benchmark, keep pressurizing themselves.
5.        The competitive spirit that is very necessary to maintain a healthy environment in the classroom can at times take away the best of the performance from the students. The students might feel too pressurized due to the rise in competition.

At Bright Side Of life, we understand that students, parents and teachers want best for everyone. But in order to achieve that best thing for our loved ones we at times stumble upon emotions that makes the student emotionally vulnerable to stress. To avoid such situations, below are few points that one could include in their lives for better communication and understanding of their thought processes:

1.       Increasing motivation towards studying a specific subject by organizing a study group. Where the students get motivated to study the subject by seeing how interested others are in that area of study.
2.        Try to avoid comparisons. Comparison done among students, friends or relatives might lead to development of insecurity in them. This insecurity could become the reason for feeling too much pressurized.
3.        Try to keep a track of physiological changes in the child. These physiological changes often result in mood swings and other emotional changes in them.
4.        Try establishing a balance between academics and personal life. Providing a specific time for each task whether it is for academic part or life back at home.
5.        Avoid procrastination and wasting your time. Most of the time we don’t realize that we are not making proper utilization of your time and lose that period of time that we could have used to complete our academic tasks.

We at Bright Side of Life try to work to help teenagers understand the intricacies and beauty of age so that they could have a smooth sailing adolescence.