Effectiveness of Calisthenic Exercises on the Stress Level of B.Sc. Nursing 1st Year Students

Abstract

Background of the Study: Stress is normal psychological and physical reaction to the demands of life. Thinking stress as a spectrum distress has been identified as a 20th century disease and viewed as a complex and dynamic transaction between individuals and environment. Stress or anxiety is not only workplace problem but different stressors affect the students. Especially nursing students experience high level of stress throughout their education. Exercise has been shown to improve your mood and decrease feeling of anxiety and stress. Calisthenics are aerobic and dynamic exercises. Which are rhythmic and smooth and enjoyable which improves mood status of an individual. So, the researcher felt that this study needs to be conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of Calisthenic exercise on stress level among of B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students in selected college of Nursing at Kolhapur.

Objectives: 1. To assess the stress level of B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students. 2. To evaluate the effectiveness of calisthenic exercises on the stress level of B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students. 3. To find out association between pre-assessment stress level score of B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students and selected socio-demographic variables.

Research method: The research approach adopted for the study was quantitative evaluative and research design was quasi-experimental, one group pre-test, post-test design. By using Probability, Simple random sampling technique 60 B. Sc. Nursing 1st year students were selected for the study. Modified Students Stress Rating Scale was used to assess the stress level of B. Sc. Nursing 1st year students. The reliability of the tool was tested by using Cronbach’s alpha. The reliability computed was r = 0.7. Data were analysed by using mean, median, mode, range, standard deviation, paired‘t’ test & chi square test.

Analysis and Interpretation: In the pretest, majority of 27(45%) participants had moderate stress, 21(35%) participants had high stress level and 12(20%) participants had low stress level where none of them had severe. In the post-test, majority of 44(73.3%) participants had low stress level and 16(26.6%) participants had moderate stress level. The calculated paired‘t’ value is (14.73) significance at level p (0.0003) < 0.05. Hence, H1 is

accepted. This indicates that Calisthenic exercise is effective in reducing the stress. Therefore, the findings revealed that Calisthenic exercises are effective in reducing stress level of B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students at selected college of Nursing. In present study in B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students, none of the sociodemographic variables are associated with stress level scores, Hence, H2 is rejected and H02 is accepted. There is no significant association between preintervention stress level scores with the selected socio demographic variables among B.Sc. Nursing 1st year students studying in selected college of Nursing at 0.05 level of significance.

Summary and conclusion: In the pretest, majority of 27(45%) participants had moderate stress, 21(35%) participants had high stress level and 12(20%) participants had low stress level where none of them had severe. In the post-test, majority of 44(73.3%) participants had low stress level and 16(26.6%) participants had moderate stress level. findings revealed that Calisthenic exercises are effective in reducing stress.