Project 3: Case Study Analysis Final Submission

Katyas situation is a difficult situation and also very relatable. In Katyas situation, she

must deal with the pressures of anxiety and self confidence. She needs to do well in her classes

or she will lose her scholarship which is devastating considering how much college costs these

days. This pressure and her low confidence means that she gets anxiety when she takes tests

which results in her doing worse. This can become a self feeding loop of doing poorly which

causes her to do poorly in the future. Therefore, it makes sense that when she is just two days

away from her chemistry final, a class that she has to do well in or shell lose her scholarship

money, she has a panic attack. She has a lot of pressure to do well and a history of doing poorly

when stressed.

I think if I were in her situation, I would panic as well, though not hard enough to have a

panic attack. I can relate to her situation because for me, school is also something that I have a

lot of pressure to do well in. For me, I need to do well, in order to help my family financially.

The situations arent exactly the same, but the pressure is similar but I think if I had a panic

attack like Katya, I would definitely consider going to seek help from a therapist. When the

pressure is high enough to affect you physically like that, there is no excuse to not seek help. Not

only that, but seeking help might help you academically in the long run, as it could relax you

enough to do well on a test. I think there are some negative feelings about seeking professional

help like being afraid that others will see something wrong in you if you seek professional help

or the costs that might come with things like therapy, but I think I would do it because my health

is very important to me or at least more important than doing well academically or financially.

Some things that I think everyone can do, to lower stress and anxiety is take a breather

every now and then and remind themselves that the world will not fall apart if something goes
wrong. When I do poorly on tests, what I used to do was hide it away and be ashamed of it and I

think that is what lead me to never learn from my mistakes. This lead me to never improve and

as a result I would get worse scores and had to lie to friends and things like that. However, after I

started to really look at my tests and show and tell my friends and scores, good or bad, I began to

own up to my scores. I learned that it wasnt so bad to fail or do poorly and as a result I could use

the tests as motivation to do better. I began testing better and from then on, I have learned to

never be ashamed of my scores. I think that once you start putting less importance on a single

failure is when you can truly grow as a person and learn from your mistakes. An article titled

Decreasing Math Anxiety in College Students describes a process of writing down positive

experiences to lower math anxiety and I think this is good advice as it looks towards the bright

side of things instead of always thinking negatively.

A second thing that people can do to lower their stress and anxiety is to have a support

group, or people that you can go to talk and encourage you when you do poorly. From an

academic journal titled, Perceived Social Support as Moderator of Perfectionism, Depression,

and Anxiety in College Students., I learned that those with a high social support and anxiety

problems, were less likely to suffer negative effects than those with low social support. This

means that the more people you can rely on in life, the easier it is to deal with stress and anxiety.

From personal experience, I would say this is true because my friends and family were a big

reason why I was able to remain focused and confident in myself and without them, I am sure I

would succumb to feelings of depression and anxiety much harder than I already have.

In order to form healthy expectations beginning each semester, one has to be realistic

with themselves. They have to understand that things will not go perfectly and that mistakes and

failures will likely happen, so acknowledging them is important. Its also important to be flexible
with your goals. While everyone should be striving for an A no matter the class, one cant be a

pure perfectionist and accept nothing less. In the article, Perfectionism, Anxiety, and Depressive

Distress: Evidence for the Mediating Role of Negative Automatic Thoughts and Anxiety Sensitivity,

being unable to accept anything less than perfection is bad for your health and often leads to

anxiety or depression.

All in all, the big takeaway from this paper is to be realistic with oneself. Having

unrealistic expectations is bad for your health and puts high pressure on yourself. This combined

with external pressure can be dangerous. If one experiences these things, one should seek help

immediately. Also, one can protect themselves from this by being realistic from the start and to

have a support group to rely on as these things can reduce stress and anxiety.

Works Cited:

References

XUETING, Z., HONG, Z., BIN, Z., & TAISHENG, C. (2013). PERCEIVED SOCIAL SUPPORT AS
 MODERATOR OF PERFECTIONISM, DEPRESSION, AND ANXIETY IN COLLEGE

STUDENTS. Social Behavior & Personality: An International Journal, 41(7), 1141-1152.

doi:10.2224/sbp.2013.41.7.1141

Perry, A. B. (2004). DECREASING MATH ANXIETY IN COLLEGE STUDENTS. College

Student Journal, 38(2), 321-324.

Pirbaglou, M., Cribbie, R., Irvine, J., Radhu, N., Vora, K., & Ritvo, P. (2013). Perfectionism,

Anxiety, and Depressive Distress: Evidence for the Mediating Role of Negative

Automatic Thoughts and Anxiety Sensitivity. Journal Of American College Health, 61(8),

477-483. doi:10.1080/07448481.2013.833932