Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-9-2020

Abstract

It is well established that graduate students face large amounts of stress during their education. Despite this, little research has focused on factors that can help this high stress population maintain well-being in the face of numerous challenges. One potentially important but neglected probable wellness determinant is the advisor-student relationship. This study explored to what extent advisor and department characteristics related to advisor selection are associated with student well-being and examined whether a positive advisor-advisee relationship can reduce the negative effects of stress on student well-being. Four hundred and forty-six graduate students from Ph.D. programs across the United States completed an online survey asking advising-related questions as well as assessments of stress, physical health, psychological well-being, and demographics. Results indicated that higher faculty advisor satisfaction was associated with reports of higher positive affect, lower negative affect, and better sleep efficiency, but slightly worse health compared to a year prior to survey. Additionally, high quality advisor-student relationships and greater control over switching advisors were associated with less affective disruption under high stress indicating possible stress buffering effects. Together, these results indicate that advisor-advisee relationships in graduate training may be an important future area of intervention and focus for campus well-being.

Comments

This is a pre-copy-editing, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in International Journal of Community Well-Being, volume 4, in 2020 following peer review. The final publication may differ and is available at Springer via https://doi.org/10.1007/s42413-020-00087-2.

A free-to-read copy of the final published article is available here.

Copyright

Springer

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