A Comparison of Anxiety Levels Among College Students

The purpose of this causal-comparative study was to compare the differences in anxiety levels among college students by their classification, gender, major, and semester hours taken. Participants were a convenience sample of 113 undergraduate and graduate college students, and were from 22 universities primarily located in the southeastern region of the United States. The participants completed a survey in which they selected their classification, gender, major, number of semester hours taken, race, ethnicity, and native language. The survey also included 20 Likert-scaled questions from the Zung Self-rating Anxiety Scale (Zung, 1971) that measured levels of anxiety based on symptoms experienced by the individual. An analysis of the results revealed that there is no significant difference in anxiety levels among college students of different classifications or by the number of semester hours taken. However, the results also revealed that there is a significant difference in anxiety levels among male and female college students and students with different majors.