| dc.description.abstract | Natural disasters are devastating for everyone impacted. They are also increasing in frequency and severity. However, research on the impact of natural disasters and education is limited, especially with a focus on their impact on college students. The beginning of the academic year is critical to adjustment for college students; it is also when Hurricane Harvey battered Houston, Texas and the surrounding areas. It is well-established that psychological distress negatively affects academic success. I will present personality factors and socioeconomic status as potential moderators of the relationship between psychological distress and academic success in the context of a natural disaster. I will apply conservation of resources theory and the transactional stress model to examine the influence of these potential moderators. I hypothesize that openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, emotional stability, and socioeconomic status will be resources that decrease the negative impact of psychological distress on grades. The sample includes college students from a large southwestern university. The hypotheses will be tested using linear regression, mediation, and moderation analyses.
Hypothesis 2, which predicted that the impact of natural disasters on students would be positively related to psychological distress, was supported. However, all hypotheses regarding the moderating effects of personality traits and socioeconomic status on the relationship between the negative effect of distress from natural disasters on academic success were not supported. These findings suggest that while natural disasters are stressful, they may not impact academic success. | en |
