Praxis: A Writing Center Journal • Vol. 20, No. 3 (2023)
Effects of Writing Center-Based Peer Tutoring on Undergraduate Students’ Perceived Stress
Matthew Grendell
Brigham Young University
mgrendell@byu.edu
Brynn Pyper
Brigham Young University
bpyper2@byu.edu
Julia Elmer
Brigham Young University
jse52@byu.edu
Brooke Overly
Brigham Young University
bkc2000@byu.edu
Marinne Hammond
Brigham Young University
marinnek@byu.edu
AbstractIn a writing center, we often hear about the relief a student feels following their session. However, there is little empirical data to support this claim. To address this gap, we conducted a survey in the Brigham Young University Family, Home, and Social Sciences Writing Lab (BYU FHSS Writing Lab). The survey was completed by undergraduate students who brought their writing to our writing center, both before and after a writing center tutoring session to measure the effects of writing tutoring on the highly applicable and relatable emotion that college students experience: stress. More specifically, we wanted to better understand perceived stress in conjunction with other variables, such as year in school, familiarity with the assigned citation style, whether the student had a plan for their paper, and whether they had visited the BYU FHSS Writing Lab in the past. We wanted to see how each of these variables were affected by a visit to the writing lab and particularly how students’ perceived stress levels were affected in turn. We discovered that visiting the BYU FHSS Writing Lab did significantly reduce perceived stress levels, and that many other factors play into this such as a student having a plan after their writing session or what year the student was in school. This research is important to writing labs across the country because by implementing our findings, writing centers may be able to maximize the help they provide to students and contribute to their stress relief.
Introduction
“I need help with my paper! It’s due at midnight, and I only have three of the required ten pages written. I can’t write it by myself, and I’m lost on what to do.” This issue has plagued almost every undergraduate student throughout college. Some students make a plan when writing papers, brainstorming and jotting down details early so they can get ahead. However, this is often not the case. The average student will push off their paper to the last minute, expecting to miraculously finish it in the last few hours until its due date. In an attempt to help these students reduce their stress levels, most universities have resources like writing labs in place.
Stress levels among undergraduates are currently extremely high (Cheung et al.), which could be a concern because of many negative outcomes linked to stress in students. High levels of perceived stress among undergraduates is linked to academic procrastination (Fincham and May) and poor academic performance (Grimes and Binder). Casuso-Holgado et al. also found that undergraduate stress can negatively impact students’ health due to its correlation with exhaustion and sleep disorders as well as overall health symptoms. This impact can also carry over into later life, leading to significant future health issues. Stawski et al. examined whether daily stress processes—daily stressors that adults experienced and their subsequent coping reactions—were associated with individuals' health later in life. The results showed that stressors are a large contributor to later cognitive health, and a negative outlook on stress often leads to poorer health outcomes. Due to these negative outcomes, it may prove useful to be aware of different ways that society can help improve adults’ stress levels in order to improve adult health.
In an attempt to relieve undergraduate stress, peer tutoring is a valuable resource provided at many universities. Peer tutoring is directly related to peer-assisted learning, which is a process in which one student helps teach fellow students through active support (Cameron et al.; Hernandez Coliñir et al.). Peer-assisted learning is also often seen as a mutual benefit, as peer tutoring benefits both the tutor and the tutee (Abbot et al.). Not only is the student able to gain tools to improve, but the act of tutoring also helps the tutor better understand what they teach. This mutual benefit is one reason why peer tutoring can be valuable in the lives of undergraduates. With an understanding of how profitable peer tutoring can be in providing assistance to students, researchers can look at different ways to relieve undergraduate stress through peer tutoring strategies.
Limited research has been conducted regarding the effects of peer tutoring on undergraduate stress; however, research has shown several other positive outcomes that result from peer tutoring or peer mentoring efforts. One study showed that assisting students by sharing helpful academic suggestions correlated with the students’ improved academic scores (Asgari and Carter). This suggests that the assistance of peers can possibly lead to better academic performance, perhaps lowering students’ stress levels as well. Another study that tested mentoring results on emotional regulation showed counteractive results, suggesting that emotionally restricted tutors or mentors do not promote mental well-being (Le et al.). This research suggests that peer tutoring students on a closer level instead may promote improved stress and emotional health.
Important to keep in mind is that tutors at writing centers are not exempt from stress themselves. Being a writing tutor can be emotionally taxing (Costello; Im et al.). Costello explains that tutors can experience role strain between being students themselves as well as being mentors to other students. Tutors may find that the expectation to maintain professionalism is emotionally burdensome (Costello; Im et al.); for example, tutors may suppress their own emotions that arise as they are trying to attend to tutees’ demands (Costello). In addition, they may feel they are not fit to be effective tutors or that no one validates the work they are doing (Costello). Based on tutors’ self report measures, possible coping strategies for tutor stress include reaching out to other tutors, setting firm expectations with students at the beginning of sessions, engaging in deep breathing, and reminding themselves that they cannot fix all of a student’s problems (Im et al.).
Stress is not only a large concern in general academia, but can also apply to specific areas, such as writing. Writing apprehension has been studied in the past to discover its connection to other stressors (Daly and Miller), and research has discovered a slight correlation between higher acknowledgment of responsibility and lower writing stress (Atkinson). However, there are gaps in the writing center literature concerning how well writing centers help alleviate stress and improve writing ability (Jones), although the peer tutoring interaction has proven to be the most influential part of the writing center process (Abbot et al.; Jones). These gaps in the literature could imply the need for additional research to be conducted on writing stress and the efficacy of writing centers.
The Family, Home, and Social Sciences (FHSS) Writing Lab is a writing center at Brigham Young University (BYU) created to assist undergraduate students with writing papers for their classes within the FHSS College. The lab is designed to help students become better writers, but another related goal of the BYU FHSS Writing Lab is to assist students in understanding their professors’ expectations about assignments and becoming comfortable with various citation styles. Many students who come into the BYU FHSS Writing Lab are experiencing a variety of stressors, some of which are often related to writing. The FHSS Writing Lab has an elaborate training program which teaches writing tutors not only to assist with writing concerns, but also to engage in some of the peer-assisted learning that Abbot et al. discuss as being influential. Following their appointments, students often communicate to us that they feel much better about their assignments and they feel less stressed. In order to verify these feelings and measure the effectiveness of peer tutoring in alleviating undergraduate students’ perceived stress, we decided to administer a survey to tutees in an attempt to understand the potential effects of the BYU FHSS Writing Lab on students’ well-being and the effectiveness of our tutoring methods.
By creating a survey to measure students’ outcomes of a writing session, tutors can understand the different factors of students’ stress and further improve their advising abilities to best reduce this stress. Instead of measuring long-term perceived stress relief, creating this survey in a pre- and post-test format would hopefully provide us data on more direct perceived stress relief experienced within the time period of a single writing appointment. We predicted that perceived general and writing stress levels would go down among undergraduates after attending the BYU FHSS Writing Lab. We also expected that students would have more perceived stress relief when they left the lab with a plan for their paper, were more comfortable with citing research, and were not required to visit the lab.
Methods
Survey Construction
With this in mind, we sought to create a survey that would capture both a student’s perceived general stress and perceived writing stress; our survey would also record data on possible factors that could influence a student’s perceived stress levels. These factors included: whether there was a required citation style, how comfortable the student was with the assigned citation style, whether the student had a plan for their paper, and whether the student was required to visit the BYU FHSS Writing Lab, came for extra credit, or came by choice. We also collected relevant demographic information such as age, gender, ethnicity, year in school, and major. It is important to note that no names nor any other identifying information were collected in an effort to maintain participants’ confidentiality.
Pre- and Post-Session Stress
In order to measure the students’ perceived stress levels, we used rating scales to capture both their perceived general stress and perceived stress about the papers they were bringing to their appointments that day. This consisted of a blank space where students were asked to rate their corresponding stress level on a scale of one to ten. To measure change in the student’s perceived stress levels, it was necessary to collect this information both prior to and following their BYU FHSS Writing Lab appointment. We did this by using the same rating scale questions on both a pre-session and post-session version of the survey. We decided that this would give us the data needed to see if there was a statistically significant difference between the pre- and post-session perceived stress levels for both general and writing stress. In addition, the difference between pre- and post-session levels of perceived stress could be used to calculate perceived stress relief, which could then be used to compare with our other measured variables to see if a student’s perceived stress relief was influenced by the other factors surrounding a writing center appointment.
Adjacent Variables Affecting Perceived Stress
One of these related factors that we measured in our survey was whether or not the student had been assigned a citation style to use in their paper. In the BYU FHSS Writing Lab, nearly every appointment addresses at least some aspect of using APA 7th, MLA 9th, or Turabian/Chicago citation styles. Knowing this, we assumed that some portion of stress could have been caused by the student’s comfort level with their assigned citation style. If so, there should have been a negative correlation between one’s comfort with their assigned citation style and their perceived stress levels concerning their paper. To capture this, we used two questions on our survey: a yes or no question on whether or not they had been assigned a specific citation style for their paper, and if so, another question with a rating scale from one to ten, asking how comfortable they were with the assigned citation style. To measure how this variable changed , these same questions were repeated in both the pre- and post-session surveys.
In addition to citation style, we have noticed that a student will often express relief when they leave our writing center with a plan for their paper. This may take the form of either knowing what they need to write next or understanding how to further revise their draft. We decided it would be important to include this variable in our analyses to understand if leaving the BYU FHSS Writing Lab with a plan could significantly improve a student’s perceived stress relief. To measure this variable, we asked students a simple yes or no question about whether or not they knew what to do next with their paper. We also wanted to know if a student had a plan to begin with when they entered the writing center. This would allow us to compare and recognize if they developed that plan while in the BYU FHSS Writing Lab or if it was a preexisting plan that they brought to their appointment. This was accomplished by again repeating the question on both the pre- and post-session surveys.
The final adjacent variable that we sought to measure was students’ level of external pressure to visit the BYU FHSS Writing Lab. At our writing center, many students choose to come simply because they need the help and guidance, but a large portion also come to the BYU FHSS Writing Lab either because their professor offered them extra credit points for coming in or strictly required them to visit the writing center with their paper. The latter is most common at our writing center in the case of courses specifically designed to teach the students how to write within their major. Requiring a tutoring session is popular not only at BYU but also at writing centers throughout the country (Babcock and Thonus; Morillas and Garrido; Smith). Ideally students would take advantage of university resources on their own accord, but according to a study conducted by Morillias and Garrido only 29% of university students took initiative and voluntarily took tutoring sessions. Due to this lack of enthusiasm, we predicted that whether a student was required to visit the lab would influence their level of perceived stress relief, because we suspected that those who were required to visit the lab would have less personal investment in their appointment. Thus, these students might rush through the appointment, wanting to finish as soon as possible, preventing them from receiving any real feedback or assistance from their appointment. This hypothesis led us to include a question on the pre-session survey that asked the students if they had been required to visit the writing center, were to receive extra credit for their appointment, or if they were not required to come in.
Survey Administration
After including these variables along with the applicable demographic information mentioned earlier in our survey, we sent our pre- and post-session surveys along with our application to the IRB here at BYU. Following a review, our study was granted exempt status and we were cleared to begin gathering data from a convenience sample of students who visited the BYU FHSS Writing Lab. Once we were granted approval, we immediately printed copies of our pre- and post-session surveys and, upon gathering verbal consent from each participant, started to give these paper surveys to students at the beginning of their writing center appointments. Students would first fill out the pre-session survey and then begin their session.
Each writing tutoring appointment lasted 15–30 minutes, during which each student sat one-on-one with a BYU FHSS Writing Lab advisor and went over any questions or concerns that they had about their paper. Together, the student and advisor worked through the paper paragraph by paragraph, encouraging the student to read their writing aloud. The advisor focused feedback on the concerns specifically mentioned by the student as well as key aspects of the paper such as the thesis or its global organization. Because advisors focused on both the students’ concerns and the needs of the paper as a whole, every writing appointment was tailored by the advisor to best fit the needs of the student.
Following their writing tutoring session, the advisor left the student alone to complete the post-session survey. It is important to note that the advisor always allowed the student to fill the survey out in private in order to prevent any influence the advisor could have on the student’s answers and to encourage the student to be as honest as possible. Once the student completed the post-session survey, they then deposited their survey into a collection box as they left the writing center. Once several surveys had accumulated in the collection box, surveys were removed, coded into Qualtrics for easy access to data, and stored in a secure, locked location. When the data collection was complete for the study, the data was then exported from Qualtrics to SPSS 27 for data analysis.
Participants
In total, 381 participants took part in our survey, ranging in age from 18–57 with an average age of 22.03 years. Our study consisted of 31% males and 69% females. When looking at the ethnicity of our sample, 85.3% were Caucasian, 6.3% were Latino or Hispanic, 2.6% were Asian, .5% were African-American, .3% were Pacific Islander, and 4.2% of the sample pertained to two or more ethnicities. In terms of year in school, 12.9% were freshmen, 36% were sophomores, 28.9% were juniors, and 22.3% were seniors. Of these students, 79% pertained to a major in the FHSS college such as psychology, family studies, economics, or history. The other 21% were either undecided or had majors in other colleges. Finally, of all the participants, 75.6% of the sample reported being required to visit the BYU FHSS Writing Lab by their professor, 4.5% received extra credit for their visit, and 19.9% came into our writing center for their own reasons.
Results
Perceived General Stress
The first variables we compared were the pre- and post-session survey responses for perceived general and writing stress to determine if there was a significant change in stress levels following a BYU FHSS Writing Lab appointment. We found that there was a significant decrease in perceived general stress between pre-session surveys (M = 5.96, SD = 1.88) and post-session surveys (M = 5.43, SD = 1.92), t(380) = 9.76, p < .001. This difference signals a significant amount of stress relief following a writing center appointment, a variable we later used for further analysis. Upon analysis of this relief in perceived general stress, we found that there was no significant difference between men and women. For significant perceived general stress relief, it did not matter if the student’s major was within or outside of the FHSS college.
Perceived Writing Stress
When comparing survey data for perceived writing stress, we found that there was also a significant decrease in perceived writing stress between the pre-session surveys (M = 5.80, SD = 2.05) and post-session surveys (M = 4.50, SD = 1.88), t(380) = 17.92, p < .001. Again, this difference was quantified to use in further analysis. Similarly to perceived general stress, there was no difference in perceived writing stress reduction on the basis of gender nor having a major within the FHSS college. However, there was a significant difference in writing stress relief based on year in school, F(3, 377) = 3.02, p = .03 (see fig. 1, Appendix A). The data revealed that freshmen showed significantly more writing stress relief than juniors, t(157) = 2.72, p = .007, and seniors, t(132) = 3.21, p = .002. Freshmen also reported having significantly higher perceived writing stress during the pre-session survey than seniors, t(132) = 4.31, p < .001.
Additionally, perceived writing stress relief and perceived general stress relief appeared to be interrelated. Relief of perceived writing stress was significantly and moderately correlated with one’s relief of perceived general stress, r(381) = .34, p < .001. Using regression analysis, we also found that one’s perceived writing stress relief predicted 11.5% of the variance in one’s perceived general stress relief (R² = .115, F(1, 379) = 49.06, p < .001). This increased to 14.5% when we added change in comfort level with citation style as an additional predictor (R² = .145, F(2, 363) = 31.89, p < .001), signaling that comfort level with citation style accounted for an additional 3% of the variance in perceived general stress relief.
Comfort with Citation Style
When examining the data collected on comfort levels with citation styles, we found that there was a significant increase in students’ comfort with citation style between the pre-session surveys (M = 5.80, SD = 2.15) and post-session surveys (M = 6.42, SD = 1.98), t(365) = 7.92, p < .001. This improvement in comfort with citation styles had a small, significant correlation with perceived writing stress relief, r(366) = .16, p = .002, and a moderate, significant correlation with perceived general stress, r(366) = .23, p < .001. Those who were not FHSS majors saw a stronger increase in their comfort level with citation style than those who were an FHSS major, t(364) = 3.51, p = .001.
Having a Plan for the Paper
To test our hypothesis that having a plan coming out of a writing center appointment would allow for greater perceived stress reduction, we performed independent sample t-tests with our collected data. We found that students who left their session with a plan showed significantly more writing stress relief than those who left without a plan, t(378) = 2.02, p = .044 (see fig. 2, Appendix A). However, this finding was not seen in perceived general stress relief. Using a chi-square test of independence, we also found that whether or not a student left their writing center appointment with a plan was significantly related to gender identity, X² (1, N = 380) = 4.31, p = .038, but not a student’s year in school nor whether or not their major was within the FHSS college.
Writing Center Visit Requirement
Finally, we found no significant change in either perceived general stress relief or perceived writing stress relief based on if the student was required, offered extra credit, or not required to come into the BYU FHSS Writing Lab. However, one of our findings about requirements was significant. We did find that those who were not required to have a writing tutor appointment saw a stronger increase in their comfort level with citation style than those who were required to visit the writing center, t(348) = 3.84, p < .001. Whether or not a student was required to visit the BYU FHSS Writing Lab or received extra credit for their visit was significantly related to their year in school, X² (6, N = 381) = 23.23, p = .001, with freshmen being the least likely to be required to visit the BYU FHSS Writing Lab (see fig. 3).
Discussion
As hypothesized, we found that the BYU FHSS Writing Lab’s appointments could help students experience a reduction in stress, signaling both perceived writing stress relief and perceived general stress relief following a writing center appointment. This aligns with the current literature on peer tutoring benefits in other aspects of student life other than academics (Abbot et al.; Asgari and Carter). Our collected data allowed us to identify other factors that appear to influence the amount of stress relief a student experiences following a visit to the writing center.
Ultimately, the conclusions drawn from our study imply that tutoring generally has a positive effect on stress levels. As aforementioned, we distributed a self-report measure before and after the student’s writing session with a peer tutor. When comparing survey data for perceived writing stress and general stress, we found that there was a significant decrease in both types of perceived stress between the pre- and post-session surveys. This would imply that when a student attends a writing center appointment, they will experience a decrease in their stress both in a general sense as well as specifically concerning their paper. Due to the correlation between the decrease in perceived general stress and perceived writing stress, it is possible that the perceived writing stress relief contributed to the perceived general stress relief that we observed in our writing center. This possibility is convincing, especially considering that perceived writing stress relief was found to be a significant predictor of perceived general stress relief.
It is unclear, however, the exact nature of why these changes in perceived stress occurred. Because we cannot prove causation and our study did not isolate the specific writing impacts of tutoring, it is possible that external factors or the simple act of meeting with a tutor may have caused these changes. When a student visits a writing center, it is highly unlikely that their sole source of stress is the assignment on which they are currently working. When examining common stressors among graduate students, El-Ghoroury et al. found that while academic load pressures were primary, many other significant stressors co-existed in students' lives such as finances and debt, mental or physical health issues, poor life balance, and family struggles. This would suggest that the perceived stress level of a student is much more complex than what might be addressed in a tutoring session, which could be why there was less general stress relief than writing stress relief in our data. Additionally, it is possible that meeting with a tutor could have contributed to this lower stress simply because it gave the student a distraction from their larger, more systemic stressors or that the opportunity to meet with a peer provided some aspect of social support and a safe environment. Without being able to isolate actual writing changes from other potential sources of stress relief, it is impossible to know exactly why students were likely to experience perceived stress relief following a writing tutoring session.
Nonetheless, we believe it is important that writing centers are aware of the different writing factors that can potentially play into a student’s perceived writing stress so that they can make their appointments more effective and helpful. One such factor we discovered was a student’s year in school. We found that freshmen benefitted the most in terms of perceived writing stress relief when compared to their upperclassmen. A variety of factors could account for this, such as less writing experience, additional stress from life changes, or other stressors that occur during this transitionary period. This is supported by the fact that freshmen tended to report higher pre-session levels of perceived writing stress than seniors. Understanding this, the data imply that freshmen are the most likely to benefit from a writing center appointment in terms of perceived stress relief. Writing centers should focus their outreach efforts on classes that are most commonly taken by freshmen—such as entry level courses and general courses required by the university—to better accommodate the needs of freshmen writers. By doing so, writing centers could reach more freshmen and be a helpful resource in lowering the stress experienced by these students. In addition, professors and faculty could encourage the freshmen in their classes to take advantage of assistance offered in a writing center to help alleviate these higher stress levels. This could be especially useful considering that in our study, freshmen were the least likely to be required to visit the university writing center.
Along with the decrease in perceived stress, the tutoring sessions also appeared to provide students with opportunities to become more comfortable with their assigned citation style. As hypothesized, increased comfort with citation style was also correlated with students’ perceived stress relief both generally and concerning their paper. Furthermore, improved comfort with citation style was a significant predictor of perceived general stress relief, signaling that citation concerns may be significant in students’ perceived stress. With this information, writing centers should ensure that they are aware of the citation styles they will frequently encounter at their university (e.g. APA 7th, MLA 9th, Turabian, Chicago) and ensure that their peer tutors are properly trained to use and teach these citation styles. This would allow for tutors to best answer students’ concerns and questions about their assigned citation style, facilitating a more effective, stress-reducing writing center appointment.
Additionally, when students left their writing tutoring session with a plan, they experienced an even greater amount of perceived writing stress relief than those who did not have a plan. Because developing a plan for future writing during a writing session is a practice that could be implemented into any writing center appointment, these results could be particularly significant. If writing center advisors can assist students in creating a plan for how to tackle the next steps in their paper, whether that be finishing a draft or starting revisions, our findings imply that the student would experience a greater amount of stress reduction when it comes to their paper. Students that may feel they have no direction for how to move forward with their paper may also experience greater writing stress to begin with, indicating greater stress relief when they develop a plan with a writing advisor. To help students feel less stressed about their writing, writing centers should specifically train their advisors on how to guide a student in identifying their next steps in the writing process, particularly as enabling the student to work on their own could help the student become more proactive and confident in their writing. These trainings may include creating worksheets or similar tools that allow for students to have a concrete visualization of their plan.
In spite of the factors we identified, whether or not a student was required to visit the writing center was not significantly related to their perceived general and writing stress levels. We had hypothesized that this variable would be important in understanding the students’ perceived stress due to their intrinsic motivation allowing for better engagement in the appointments, but this did not appear to be the case. This may be because regardless of a student’s reasons for coming to the writing center, advisors may still suggest improvements and provide helpful feedback, allowing students to feel less stressed about their paper. In retrospect, this aligns with Runciman and Gordon, who found that requiring writing center visits did not negatively affect the majority of students’ views of the writing center. Further, most students, regardless of their motivation, believed that the writing center could help them and had similar levels of stress reduction. Another potential reason for stress reduction could be that those who have writing center appointments report significantly less procrastination, so requiring these appointments could be the push that students need to get assignments done early (Young and Fritzsche). This would imply that professors could be more open to requiring their students to visit the university’s writing center, as it could be beneficial for the student regardless of their motivation, increasing the odds that they feel at least some amount of stress relief. In addition, by pairing this finding with the previously discussed finding of the greater stress relief experienced by freshmen, universities could include an incentive program for first year students to encourage them to visit their university’s writing center. Because it would appear that being required or incentivized to visit the writing center does not diminish the effectiveness of an appointment, if universities were to include incentives to visit the writing center as part of first-year programs, then they could help contribute to the stress relief felt by new university students, thus helping ease the transition into this new phase of life.
Considering our study as a whole, we are able to identify several strengths of this research. One of these strengths was our large sample size which allowed us to minimize the chance of errors or inaccurate findings. Along with this, our pre/post design allowed us to accurately measure individual change in each student in terms of stress, allowing us to quantify one’s perceived stress relief. We were also able to successfully identify important factors in understanding a student’s perceived stress levels, which helped us understand how to maximize the effect of a writing center appointment on students’ perceived stress.
While we believe our study adds beneficial knowledge to the body of research on undergraduate stress and tutoring services, the experiment contained weaknesses important to note. For example, our lack of a control group leaves the question of whether it was attending a writing center appointment that influenced students’ perceived general and writing stress or simply the act of sitting down to work on the paper itself. We also used a convenience sample which inhibited complete experimental control over our groups; in turn, the external validity of our study was limited. Furthermore, our sample was predominantly Caucasian young adults. Due to our lack of ethnic diversity, generalization may be restricted further as one’s own culture could influence the effectiveness of a writing center's services. Also, while our sample did include some non-traditional students, our findings may not fully generalize to the experience of those returning to universities later in life. There also exists the possibility of a positivity bias in which students did not want to admit to experiencing little to no change in their perceived stress levels. This could have inflated our data due to the self-report nature of the survey.
Implications
In order to address these weaknesses and build upon our findings, further research is necessary. For example, investigators could replicate our study on other campuses or in a writing center with a broader focus than the BYU FHSS Writing Lab. This would build upon the external validity of our findings, which could also be accomplished by replicating our study with the addition of a control group where students spend 30 minutes working on their paper alone as compared to working with a writing center advisor. Further, tutoring sessions in different disciplines, such as mathematics or music, could be studied to see if there is a similar effect in students’ perceived stress levels. Investigators could replicate this study generally in other writing centers to allow the results to be more nationally relevant. Researchers could also investigate the replicability of these findings among a population with more demanding writing assignments, such as graduate level students. It could also be beneficial to explore these findings through more objective measures of stress with the hope of negating any potential positivity bias present in the data.
Although our findings indicate that all writing centers could have a positive impact on students’ stress levels, BYU students in particular have unique writing concerns that the BYU FHSS Writing Lab seeks to alleviate. While limited research has been conducted on overall stress levels of students at BYU in comparison to other universities, it is hypothesized that BYU students may experience unique religious expectations that cause high stress levels in conjunction with the academic rigor of a college education. Additionally, many BYU students serve a church service mission before/during their college education and are not in school for 18-24 months before attending/returning to BYU, and these recently returned missionaries express insecurity in their writing that is often compounded when they have major writing assignments. Many of these recently returned missionaries attend the FHSS Writing Lab and are part of the writing lab’s clientele, in turn experiencing these same reductions in stress as reported in this research. Likely with some of these considerations in mind, many writing classes within the FHSS college at BYU require their students to attend the FHSS Writing Lab to solidify writing techniques and styles specific to the social sciences. BYU has created a place for the FHSS Writing Lab to exist and thrive that also helps students in their writing pursuits within the FHSS College.
While the FHSS Writing Lab is a crucial part of the FHSS College, efforts could be made to encourage more students to attend and for the writing lab to become involved in more classes and with more professors, particularly in light of this research. The BYU FHSS Writing Lab could seek additional funding to hire a greater number of writing advisors to sponsor more slots for appointments. Advertising efforts could also focus on some of these studied areas of writing concerns (e.g., citation style, developing a plan, younger writers) because of what has been found to indicate their effect on stress and the writing lab’s approach to alleviate stress. BYU should also continue encouraging, if not requiring, students to attend these tutoring sessions as they could provide valuable tools to students who would otherwise not attend. Professors could also have more interactions with FHSS Writing Lab advisors in training for their assignments and following up with how their students have been doing in sessions. There could be many opportunities moving forward to help the FHSS Writing Lab reach a bigger audience and assist more students who could gain benefits from attending.
Overall, among the many benefits of peer tutoring, our findings illuminated the additional positive effects writing tutoring has on perceived stress levels. Given the major role that stress can play in an undergraduate’s life, small steps towards reducing such stress should be taken. Our study shows that attending a writing center may be helpful in that process. To support this goal, writing centers should focus on maximizing the help we can provide to students by implementing strategies such as developing a plan. By doing so, we can help ease the stress undergraduate students experience during this critical transitionary period in their lives.
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Appendix A: Figures
Figure 1: Pre-Session vs Post-Session Stress Relief by School Year
Figure 2: Mean of Writing Relief by Plan Status Post-Session
