Coping strategies among professional social work trainees - A cross-sectional study from India's capital city

Abstract

BACKGROUND:

To find out the nature of coping strategies and the relationship between coping strategies and background characteristics of Master of Social Work (MSW) students in Delhi.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

The sample size is 297 (male 123 and female 174) by adopting a non-probability purposive method. A survey among the MSW students (first and second years) of four Universities in Delhi was carried out.

RESULT:

The result shows that the most used coping strategies are positive in nature (emotional and problem-focused).

CONCLUSION:

The utilization of coping strategies is influenced by the background characteristics of the respondents. It necessitates further awareness of positive coping strategies by introducing changes in the curriculum of the MSW program.

Introduction

Social work trainees experience challenging and stressful situations during their field placements due to clients' problems and demands of professional conduct, assignments, and future job placements, which may result in the development of psychological distress.[1] As such, social work students need to develop coping strategies for effectively managing stress and developing resilience. Coping strategies can be both positive and negative in nature, where positive coping strategies lead to positive change and an increase in stress resilience, while negative coping strategies may lead to negative change and possibly decrease stress resilience.[2] Further, the field of stress management is expanding day by day with the addition of new research on coping strategies, both popular and academic, as people cope with stress and its impact in a wide number of ways in their life.[3]

The coping strategies as defined by Lazarus and Folkman (1984)[4] refer to a range of behavioral, emotional, and cognitive ways to adapt to a stressful situation. As proposed by Lazarus (1991),[5] this underline four main assumptions. First, the nature and characteristics of the coping strategy are the basis of classification, not the effect of the coping. Secondly, the coping process includes cognitive and behavioral responses in the concerned person.[6] Also, the coping process is considered a sequence of interconnecting coping episodes or actions, as in most cases, coping includes different individual acts connected in a sequence.[4] Lastly, the coping action can be classified according to the area of the stressor that has to be changed.[5] Social support is focused on utilizing the support of peers, family, and other people to deal with stressful situations.

Several studies have been carried out to explore coping strategies used by social work students, especially during their fieldwork, and several coping strategies have emerged from the review of the present research, namely, problem-focused, emotion-focused, and social support. Problem-focused coping strategies are used by many social work students in their daily lives and are actively required to cope with stress.[7] Mazo (2015)[8] reported that students have reported problem identification and solving, acceptance, and asking advice from friends and family to solve the problem as “Always” utilized coping strategies, implying that students focus on the problem-solving aspect while dealing with a stressor.

In relation to emotion-focused coping strategies,[9] we have emphasized the role of controlling emotions while dealing with stressful situations both in the classroom and field work. Mazo[8] also reported that students emphasized emotional control while dealing with a stressor. As a part of emotion-focused coping strategies, students engage in distraction (both positive and negative) or denial as a part of self-care or may also try to accept and redefine the situation as a part of coping with distress.[1] Wils (2008)[10] in their research on social support reported that social support (from peers and family) positively influences resilience, which in turn influences the level of stress, signifying that an increase in social support indirectly decreases the level of stress in social work students.

Studying the impact of the choice of coping strategies has also been done by some researchers. For example,[11] we concluded that avoidant coping strategies or negative coping strategies such as denial, isolation, behavioral disengagement, self-distraction, etc. positively correlated with depressive symptoms and that increased intensity and frequency can negatively influence psychological health and increase the level of distress in social work students. On the other hand, positive emotion, and problem-focused strategies such as acceptance of the situation, emotional management, problem-solving, etc. had a positive impact on the level of stress in social work students.[7]

In conclusion, as social work students belong to a helping profession, they may use a variety of coping strategies, both positive and negative, that may result in an increase or decrease in stress resilience.[12] Therefore, it is important to analyze the nature of the coping strategies used by MSW students. An attempt has been made in this study to understand the nature of coping strategies used and the relationship between coping strategies and the background characteristics of Social Work students in Delhi.

Materials and Methods

Study design and setting

To give justice to the aims and objectives, the study has developed a descriptive research design with quantitative analysis. A survey using a questionnaire containing socio-demographic details and a coping strategies scale was used.

Delhi is chosen as the area of study. It is home to some of the oldest and leading Universities in the field of social work, as well as private Universities that have recently established themselves in the field of social work. Also, Delhi offers social work students the opportunity to pursue a Master of Social Work through correspondence or open-distance mode at various Universities. Also, Delhi offers a lot of opportunities to newly trained social workers in the fields of academia, NGOs, and the corporate and government sectors.

Study participants and sampling

During the year 2018, four Universities offered MSW in Delhi. A total of 297 students who enrolled at the Masters of Social Work Programme were selected as respondents for the study. Thus, the sample respondents have been selected by using a non-probability purposive sampling technique.

Inclusion criteria

The research focuses on students currently enrolled in a Master of Social Work course in one of the four Universities selected for the research. The inclusion criteria for sampling include MSW students in their first and second years of the 2018–2019. In other words, only those first-year MSW students were included who were enrolled for course session 2018–2020, and those second-year MSW students were included who were enrolled for course session 2017–2019. This was done to maintain uniformity in the sampling of social work students for the research. Also, since the maximum duration of the course in U3 is five years, students of different batch years from 2017 onwards have been considered, as the conventional two-year system is not applicable in this case.

Data collection tools and technique

To collect the data from the individual respondents, a self-prepared questionnaire was administered by the researcher to collect the socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. The measurement of coping strategies in the respondents has been studied using the Coping Checklist developed by Rao K et al.,[13] The checklist includes multiple questions related to each way of coping to overcome academic stress, namely problem-focused coping, emotion-focused coping, and seeking social support. Emotion-focused coping has five sub-scales: acceptance and redefinition, distraction positive, distraction negative, denial or blame, and religion or faith.

Ethical consideration

The purpose and voluntary nature of the study were explained to the participants. Their consent was taken before commencing each interview. Confidentiality was assured to all the participants.

Statistical analysis

Tests for non-parametric data analysis have been used. Since the sample size of the selected five background characteristics was unequal and homogeneity of variances was violated, Mann-Whitney U test for the year of study, gender, family type, and work experience and Kruskal–Wallis tests for age group were employed. Further, to analyze the types of coping strategies used by respondents, a ranking of the utilization of each strategy using Friedman's two-way ANOVA test was carried out.

Results

Socio-demographic analysis

Among the 297 respondents, 147 were from the first year of MSW, and the remaining 150 were from the second year, comprising 123 (male) and 174 (female) students. There were 102 and 195 respondents from joint and nuclear families, respectively. There were 232 respondents with no previous or current work experience and 65 respondents with work experience. The age profile shows that 120, 134, and 43 respondents were from the age groups of 22 years and below (AG1), above 22 and below 25 years (AG2), and 25 years and above (AG3), respectively. These background characteristics of the respondents were analyzed to assess the nature of coping strategies utilized by using standardized tools, and the results are given below:

Tables 1 and 2 show that the most utilized coping strategies are ways of acceptance/redefinition of the stressful situation (mean rank 5.72), problem-focused coping (mean rank 5.46), and social support (5.13), and the least utilized are negative ways of distraction (2.03), denial and blame (2.18), and indulging in activities of religion and faith (mean rank 2.86). Further, the P value obtained for the ANOVA test in pair-wise comparison in Table 2 shows that there is a significant mean rank difference between the various ways of coping. However, there is no significant difference between the mean rank of negative ways of distraction and denial/blame, indicating that both are the least used ways of coping. Further, there is no significant difference between the mean rank of acceptance/redefinition of problems and problem-focused coping, indicating that both are used equally by most respondents.

Table 1.

Mean rank comparison of various coping methods

Ways of coping	Mean rank	Test value	P
Problem-focused	5.46	977.89	0.00*
Emotion-focused (EF): Distraction-positive	4.62
Emotion-focused (EF): Distraction-negative	2.03
Emotion-focused (EF): Acceptance/redefinition	5.72
Emotion-focused (EF): Religion/Faith	2.86
Emotion-focused (EF): Denial/Blame	2.18
Social support	5.13

Table 2.

Pair-wise comparison of mean ranks of various coping methods

Pairwise comparison	Z-scores	P
EF-Distraction negative: EF Denial/Blame	-0.146	0.409
EF-Distraction negative: EF-Religion/Faith	-0.832	0.000*
EF-Distraction negative: EF-Distraction-positive	2.586	0.000*
EF-Distraction negative: Social support	-3.101	0.000*
EF-Distraction negative: Problem-focused	3.429	0.000*
EF-Distraction negative: EF-Acceptance/Redefinition	-3.694	0.000*
EF-Denial/Blame: EF-Religion/Faith	0.685	0.000*
EF-Denial/Blame: EF-Distraction positive	2.439	0.000*
EF-Denial/Blame: Social support	-2.955	0.000*
EF-Denial/Blame: Problem-focused	3.283	0.000*
EF-Denial/Blame: EF-Acceptance/Redefinition	3.547	0.000*
EF-Religion/Faith: EF-Distraction positive	1.754	0.000*
EF-Religion/Faith: Social support	-2.269	0.000*
EF-Religion/Faith: Problem-focused	2.598	0.000*
EF-Religion/Faith: EF-Acceptance/Redefinition	2.862	0.000*
EF-Distraction positive: Social support	-0.515	0.004*
EF-Distraction positive: Problem-focused	0.843	0.000*
EF-Distraction positive: EF- Acceptance/Redefinition	-1.108	0.000*
Social support: Problem-focused	0.328	0.064**
Social support: EF-Acceptance/Redefinition	0.593	0.001*
Problem-focused: EF-Acceptance/Redefinition	-0.264	0.136

*Significant at the 0.05 level of significance; **Significant at the 0.1 level of significance

Table 3 shows that although the mean coping score of female respondents is higher than that of male respondents, gender is not a statistically significant factor for the overall coping score (P value >0.1). However, the difference between the mean ranks of males and females is significant in the case of coping ways of EF-acceptance/redefinition and EF-religion/faith, where male respondents indulge more in activities of religion or faith (mean rank 158.83) and use less EF-acceptance/redefinition ways of coping (mean rank 137.05) than their female counterparts (mean rank 142.05 for religion and 157.45 for acceptance). This signifies that the female respondents use emotion-focused strategies more than the male respondents. The findings for work experience show that respondents with work experience have a higher mean rank for overall coping score (184.66), which indicates that they use more positive ways of coping than their counterparts with no work experience (mean rank-139.01). The results for an age group in Table 3 show that the mean rank for overall coping score is significantly higher for AG-3 (211.15) than that of other groups (AG-1- 130.01 AG-2-146.06), indicating that respondents of more than 25 years used more positive ways of coping than the other age groups. Also, it is noted that respondents in the age group of less than 23 years used more denial and blame ways of coping than respondents in the age group of 25 years and older.

Table 3.

Comparative analysis of the level of coping strategies across characteristics

Categories	Overall coping score	Problem- focused	EF- Distraction- positive	EF- Distraction negative	EF - Acceptance/redefinition	EF - Religion/Faith	EF - Denial/Blame	Social support
Gender
Mean Rank
Male	141.1	144.1	141.5	153.1	137.1	158.9	153.6	140
Female	154.6	152.5	154.2	146.1	157.5	142.1	145.8	155
MW value	9718	1009	9781	1019	9231	9491	1014	9581
P	0.18	0.39	0.2	0.48	0.04	0.09	0.43	0.11
Year of Study
Mean Rank
1st	141.7	151.1	136.7	141.2	151.5	142.5	147.4	135
2nd	156.1	146.9	161.0	156.7	146.5	155.4	150.5	163
MW value	9954	1072	9221	9872	10657	10062	1079	9008
P	0.15	0.67	0.01	0.11	0.61	0.19	0.75	0
Type of family
Mean Rank
Nuclear	139.2	148.2	145.3	152.5	146.9	142.2	156.1	144.1
Joint	167.7	150.4	155.8	142.2	152.9	161.9	135.4	158.5
Mann Whitney U	8035	9798	9249	9254	9539	8629.	8559	9006
P	0.01	0.83	0.32	0.32	0.56	0.06	0.05	0.17
Work experience
Mean Rank
Nil	139.0	150.9	142.2	147.7	143.6	144.5	155.2	141
Yes	184.6	142.1	172.9	153.5	168.3	164.7	126.8	178
MW value	5222	7097	5984	7247	6287	6518	6100	9006
P	0	0.45	0.01	0.63	0.04	0.09	0.02	0.17
Age Group
Mean Rank
AG1	130.0	149.1	138.4	152.1	143.3	138.3	159.6	138
AG2	146.1	146.2	144.9	144.0	140.4	148.2	146.3	145
AG3	211.2	154.1	191.0	155.9	191.9	181.3	128	193
Chi square	28.55	0.33	12.72	0.91	13.12	8.17	4.67	14.6
P	0	0.85	0	0.63	0	0.02	0.097	0
P of pairwise comparison
AG1-AG2	0.14	-	0.54	-	0.79	0.35	0.21	0.46
AG1-AG3	0	-	0	-	0	0	0.04	0
AG2-AG3	0	-	0	-	0	0.03	0.22	0

Level of significance of the P of 0.1

Discussion

The results of the ANOVA test for different coping strategies show that the mean ranks of negative ways of coping (negative distraction, denial, and blame) are significantly different from the mean ranks of positive ways of coping (acceptance/redefinition, problem-focused, and social support), indicating that there is a significant difference between the percentage of respondents using the negative ways and the percentage of respondents using the positive ways. Thus, it is evident from the results obtained that the respondents used positive ways of coping significantly to a greater extent than negative ways of coping. These findings for the ANOVA test are like those of[8,10,14] who reported using positive coping methods, including problem-focused, acceptance of problems, positive distraction from problems, and support from family.

Thus, the present finding's variation of coping strategies according to the year of study corroborates that of,[15] who reported that junior students reported less social support and more negative distraction than their senior counterparts. Also, the findings tabulated in Table 3 show that although gender is not a statistically significant factor for the overall coping score, female respondents use emotion-focused strategies more than male respondents. The findings are like those of a study done by Vungkhanching (2017)[15] who concluded that female social work students reported higher utilization of both problem- and emotion-focused coping strategies than male social work students.

Both age and work experience were found to be significant factors, as observed in Table 3. Various studies have highlighted the role of age and experience in dealing with psychological distress, where it has been found that more positive and less aggressive ways are opted for by older individuals[16,17] They have also highlighted that with an increase in work experience, resilience increases and the positive way of coping also increases. Stanley and his colleague (2021)[18] in their longitudinal study of coping strategies in social work students have also concluded that as the duration of the course and the age of students increase, the coping strategies adopted by social work students become more positive.

The type of family determines the nature of family support available to an individual and can influence the coping strategies used by an individual, as has been demonstrated by Nebhinani and Kumar (2020).[19] In their study on college students in India, they found that students belonging to joint families showed more utilization of social support and better coping strategies than students belonging to nuclear families. The present findings highlight the role of type of family in determining utilization of coping strategies, with students belonging to joint families showing more utilization of social support as well as overall coping strategies, thus corroborating previous studies.[6]

Conclusion

The results show that the respondents use more emotional acceptance and redefinition of problems, problem-focused and social support methods of coping with psychological distress. This indicates that the selection of the coping method depends on the nature of its impact on the respondent. It further signifies that the respondents mostly use those coping methods that have a positive impact on their problem, emotions, or the overall situation and indulge less in the detrimental methods. Further, it has been proven from the Mann-Whitney U test that respondents belonging to joint families and respondents with work experience show higher utilization of positive coping strategies. Similarly, the Kruskal–Wallis test has proved that there is a significant difference in the utilization of coping strategies across the various age groups, with higher age groups showing more utilization of positive coping strategies. Therefore, there is a need to incorporate suitable components in the curriculum from the first year onward for efficient utilization of coping strategies by social work students.

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.