School Psycho-Social Stress Variables and Academic Achievement Motivation of Senior Secondary Two Students in Uyo Education Zone

Abstract

This study was carried out to examine the influence of some psycho-social stress variables on academic achievement motivation of Senior Secondary Two (SS 2) students in public secondary schools in Uyo Education Zone, Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. Three null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The survey research design was used in carrying out the study. The population for the study comprised all the 10,871 students in SS 2 classes in 36 public secondary schools in the four Local Government Areas of Uyo Education Zone. The sample used for this study consists of 420 SS 2 students. The Purposive sampling technique was used to select 20 secondary schools from the study area, while the Simple Random sampling technique was used to select the sample for the study. One researcher made instrument titled "School Psycho-Social Stressors Questionnaire” (SPSSQ) and a standardized instrument titled "Aberdeen Academic Achievement Motivation Inventory” (AAAMI) were used to collect data from the respondents. The Cronbach Alpha Analysis was used to compute the reliability of the research instruments used for the study. This yielded reliability coefficients of .70 for the SPSSQ and .76 for the AAAMI which were considered sufficient for the study. The dependent t-test was used to test the null hypotheses. The results led to the rejection of all the null hypotheses.  Based on the findings, it was concluded that academic frustration, social anxiety, and self-loathing have significant influence on the academic achievement motivation of Senior Secondary Two students in Uyo Education Zone. Recommendations made include, among others, that teachers and counsellors should help students in setting realistic goals to keep them motivated and reduce the attendant frustration that sets in when goals are not met and more attention needs to be paid on students' mental wellbeing and appropriate referrals made when and where necessary.