Addressing Academic Stress with Emotional Intelligence: A Counsellor’s Perspective

Stress is a state of physiological and psychological disequilibrium whichhas devastating and debilitating effects on individuals. Students experienceacademic stress with the great source from test-taking, studying forexaminations, grade competition, completion of assignment, workload etc.Inability to manage stress effectively results in prevalence of failure, poorperformance, truancy, drop-outs, lack of motivation, feeling of inadequacy,frustration and dejection among students. In view of this, the emotionalintelligence competencies of self-awareness and self-management areconsidered for managing academic stress under this study. This papertherefore examines the concepts of stress, academic stress, emotionalintelligence and its competencies. Finally, the paper recommends that allstudents should be equipped with emotional intelligence competencies soas to manage academic stress in a healthy manner