Abstract:

Although for the past two decades there has been a growing interest in the promotion of mental health, as well as its study as an empirical construct, the COVID-19 pandemic has given many new challenges to students and teachers who have to deal with its broad impacts as a result of universities being closed, distancing, isolation, and other unexpected stressful changes in their everyday lives. This is an additional reason for placing greater focus on strengthening protective factors through psychological empowerment, encouraging positive interpersonal interactions, providing social responsibility and, on the other hand, reducing the risk factors of isolation, alienation, dropping out of studies, engaging in risky and criminal behaviours...Accordingly, the goal of this research was set, which aims to determine whether there are differences in the self-assessments of the mental health of students who had teacher support and who did not have teacher support during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sample of respondents consisted of 239 students of the Faculty of Teacher Education, University of Zagreb, Croatia. The research used the MHS-SF instrument validated on the population of Croatian students and for which the authors’ written consent was obtained (Vuletić, Erdeši, Nikić, 2018) with added variables related to different environmental support during the pandemic. The research was previously approved by the Commission for Research Evaluation of Research Ethics. In data processing, along with the calculation of basic statistical values, a discriminant analysis was used as an integral part of the licensed SPSS program 24.0 Standard Campus Edition. The results show that there are differences in the assessments of their own mental health with regard to the fact whether students had or did not have support from teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic, in a way that students who estimated that they had support from teachers were more likely to estimate that the society in which they lived was good and acceptable to them and other people, that they had good relationships filled with understanding with persons close to them, that their life was meaningful, and that they had a purpose and direction in life. It can be concluded that students who had teacher support felt social and psychological well-being, but not emotional well-being in that context. The value of the research lies in the fact that it deals with issues of students’ positive mental health, measuring the current state with the purpose of focusing on strategies that promote and maintain a high level of students’ mental health and well-being in general.

Keywords:

Positive mental health, students, COVID-19, teacher support, well-being.