The Role of Stress Resistance, Resilience and Social Support in Stress Perception and Coping Behavior of Adolescents

The article presents the results of a comparative study of the peculiarities of perceived stress and coping behavior of adolescents in connection with their personality and social characteristics. The study involved 100 adolescents 16-17 years old, school students (49 males and 51 females). Hypotheses of the study: 1. Female's more intense and emotionally saturated perception of stress is closely related to their use of unproductive and social coping behaviors, in contrast to their male peers. 2. In adolescent, stress resistance, resilience and perceived social support have gender specificity, which is manifested in the fact that they play a more significant role for females both in the perception of a stressful situation and in the choice of ways of coping with stress. Methods: Scale of Perceived Stress-10; Adolescent Coping Scale (ACS); Stress Resistance Diagnostic Test by Yu.V. Shcherbatykh; S. Muddy's hardiness questionnaire; Questionnaire of social support of G. Sommer and T. Fydrich. According to the results of the study both hypotheses were partially confirmed. Gender differences have been revealed, which are manifested in more intense perception and experience of stress by females, compared to their peers young men. However, the use of social coping in the form of seeking professional help is more characteristic of young men. Stress tolerance, resilience and satisfaction with social support were found to significantly determine the female's perception, experience of stress and coping with it, while they influence the choice of different ways of coping with stress, regardless of the gender of the respondents. It was also found that instrumental support as providing teenagers with ready-made solutions provokes the use of unproductive coping methods. The results of the study allowed us to determine the targets of psychological influences in order to help adolescents in stressful situations and reduce the risk of choosing unproductive ways of responding to them, taking into account individualpsychological characteristics.