Acculturative Stress Among International Postgraduate Students at UKM

Abstract

The self-administered questionnaire contained the short version of the Social, Attitudinal, Familial and Environmental Acculturative Stress Scale (SAFE), was used to determine the acculturative stress among international postgraduate university students. The instrument measures four aspects of acculturative stress, including social, attitudinal, family and environment. It contained 21 items in Likert 5-point response format. The sample consisted of 24 (16 males and 8 females) postgraduate students studying in School of Psychology and Human Development, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). The stress level among different gender and age groups were measured using t-test. Results indicated that the top two sources of acculturative stress were: environment and attitude. However, there was no significant different of acculturative stress between genders and different age groups. The findings from this study provided some knowledge and understanding of the sources of stress among international postgraduate university students which are crucial for implementing stress reduction strategies, because stress may reduce motivation and decrease in academic performance.