Hypothesis 2: It is hypothesized that lower-class students would evidence higher
levels of academic stress compared to their middle-class counterparts, particularly
with respect to economic or material sources (e.g., tuition, securing study material,
finding a steady source of income). Prior research (Diaz-Guerrero 1976; Kata 1975;
Zeidner and Safir 1989) suggests that, regardless of culture, subjects coming from
low socioeconomic status backgrounds score consistently higher than their upper
class counterparts on measures of stress and anxiety. The stress reactions among
lower-class students may be attributed to a developmental history of success and
failure in evaluative situations, and lower-class students may be predisposed to
various forms of evaluative stress, which becomes stabilized during the school years
(Zeidner and Safir 1989).