Academic stress and home environment: A quantitative study among school adolescents

Abstract Academic performance is negatively impacted by an unfriendly home environment and increases academic stress among school students. This study examined the association between academic stress and home environment as well as explored the influence of the home environment in causing academic stress among adolescent school students. One hundred and twenty (120) school students were randomly selected from a government school and three private schools in Tiruvannamalai district, Tamil Nadu, India, and completed the measures of academic stress and home environment by using the Educational Stress Scale for Adolescent (ESSA; Sun et al., 2011) and Home Environment Inventory (HEI; Mishra, 1983). The findings revealed that academic stress did not differ significantly among school students, regardless of gender or type of school (government vs. private). In the home environment, however, there was a significant gender difference in the control sub-dimension and social isolation. Also, there was an association between academic stress and home environment dimensions such as control, punishment, and deprivation of privileges. Punishment was positively influenced by academic stress, whereas nurturance was negatively influenced by academic stress. These findings were discussed about the reduction of negative home environment outcomes in individuals experiencing academic stress.