Student Resilience Essay

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Key words
Resilience, postgraduate, academic success, North-West University (VTC), Behavioural Science faculty, academic demands.

Background
Resilience has been defined as the capability to adapt to the difficult situations in life such as trauma, change and threats (American Psychological Association, 2015; Robertson & Cooper, 2011) and be able to ‘bounce back’ from life’s adversity. The years spent on studying at tertiary institutions represent a significant adjustment and certain level of personal development to students. It is imperative for students to have resilience in order to enable them to meet academic and social demands which are related to being a postgraduate student (Adelman and Taylor, 2003).
Research has been conducted internationally to explore whether having resilience influences postgraduate student’s ability to cope with stress more effectively and ultimately assist in dealing with academic demands. The research concluded that students who have high levels of resiliency displayed the capability to deal more effectively with academic demands and stress than their counterparts who displayed …show more content…

In accumulation with academic demands, time constraints, financial stress, or interpersonal stress can impinge on the students’ wellbeing. The study further states that an optimal amount of stress can be encouraging and healthy; however, when stress is overwhelming, emotional problems may develop. The capability to effectively deal with the stress posed by academic and social demands largely depends on the resilience of the students. When students are stressed, they are more likely not being able to achieve academic success and consequently, be unable to complete their studies. Tertiary institutions need to be proactive and construct accessible supportive systems for the

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