Psychological distress among students of higher education due to e-learning crackup: moderating role of university support

Abstract

Purpose

The emergence of electronic learning during the COVID-19 outbreak has been the way by which higher education has attempted to save the situation. However, e-learning still causes psychological distress because of its crackups and fear. Hence, the authors aim to study the impact of e-learning crackup on fear of academic year loss and psychological distress by incorporating university support as a moderator.

Design/methodology/approach

Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) has been used to analyze data.

Findings

The results depict that e-learning crackup fosters students' fear of academic year loss, but e-learning crackup has an insignificant impact on psychological distress. However, psychological distress is driven by fear of an academic year loss. Lastly, university support moderates the relationship between e-learning crackup and psychological distress, but no moderating role exists between fear of academic year loss and psychological distress.

Originality/value

The recent pandemic has severely affected the mental health of students. Therefore, it is crucial to study the reasons that foster distress among them. But, unfortunately, there is a prominent absence of research for inspecting students' psychological distress because of the e-learning crisis, especially in the wake of COVID-19.

Citation

Qazi, Z., Qazi, W., Raza, S.A. and Khan, K.A. (2022), "Psychological distress among students of higher education due to e-learning crackup: moderating role of university support", Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education, Vol. 14 No. 4, pp. 1656-1669. https://doi.org/10.1108/JARHE-02-2021-0069