Role stress, personal strain, and coping among counseling psychology graduate student

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to investigate role stress, personal strain, and coping among graduate students in counseling psychology. Role stress was examined according to the subjects' perceptions of the graduate school environment in areas such as workload, and clarity of faculty expectations. Personal strain was examined according to the subjects' reported difficulties with, for example, interpersonal relationships. Coping was examined according to the subjects' reported resources. No studies have investigated the experience of counseling psychology graduate students in these specific areas.;Method. The subjects were 145 counseling psychology graduate students who are student affiliates of Division 17 (Counseling Psychology) of the American Psychological Association. Data was gathered by two mailings sent three weeks apart. The instruments used were a demographic questionnaire and the Occupational Stress Inventory which contains 14 subscales that measure role stress, personal strain, and coping behaviors. The research hypotheses tested for differences between subjects when grouped by academic status, various demographic characteristics, and other descriptors of the subjects' educational experience.;Results. The results of the multivariate analyses of variance indicated that females scored significantly higher than males on the subscales of Role Overload, Role Ambiguity, and Responsibility. Males scored significantly higher than females on the subscales of Role Insufficiency and Vocational Strain. Students in the oldest age group scored significantly higher than younger students on the subscale of Role Ambiguity. Married subjects scored significantly higher than single subjects on the subscales of Interpersonal Strain and Social Support. Subjects who reported being extremely satisfied with their academic training scored significantly higher on the subscales of Role Insufficiency, Role Ambiguity, and Social Support than moderately or less satisfied subjects.;Conclusion. The findings of this study indicate that differences in role stress, personal strain, and/or coping exist among counseling psychology graduate students when grouped by sex, age, marital status, and satisfaction level. The lack of information of this kind on graduate students in the field of counseling psychology points to the importance of the data gathered. Nevertheless, continued research is necessary in the effort to gain a better understanding of the impact of the training process in counseling psychology.