Co-Rumination as a Predictor of Academic Anxiety Among Higher Education Students in the Philippines

Co-rumination is conceptualized as “extended discussions of problems and negative feelings within a relationship” among peers. Co-rumination has been found related to different internalizing problems, such as anxiety. With the increasing pressure students experience from higher education programs, students may become more susceptible to academic anxiety. Previous studies exploring anxiety among higher education students have not established whether co-rumination can predict academic anxiety among Filipinos. The purpose of this study is to determine the predictive nature of co-rumination on academic anxiety among higher education students. Using a quantitative, correlational method, data were gathered from 173 undergraduate students selected from a population of 1,700 undergraduate students through purposive sampling technique. Respondents have answered validated self-reported questionnaire instruments that assessed both variables: co-rumination and academic anxiety. The results showed that respondents scored moderately high on both co-rumination and academic anxiety. The Pearson correlation analysis showed that there was a low positive correlation between co-rumination and academic anxiety (r = .384), but it was statistically insignificant at .05 level (p < .05). Simple linear regression results showed that there was no significant prediction of academic anxiety based from co-rumination, with R2 being 14.7%. Although higher education students experience co-rumination and showed positive correlation with academic anxiety, co-rumination did not significantly predict academic anxiety. Other psychological and situational variables need to be assessed to better understand academic anxiety among Filipinos in college.