How Does the Nature of Academics Affect the Study-Life Balance of International Students in Chinese Universities?

Abstract

Study-life balance is an emerging issue in contemporary management and administrative thought. Without a balance between study and life, students will not be happier and wiser in their academic and personal lives. During the doctoral study period of foreign students, most students live alone and need to adapt to the new environment, but some students live with their families. So they have to maintain their normal lab work, family life and social life at the same time. Consistent with this, the prevailing perception is that students majoring in applied sciences spend more time and stress than students majoring in social sciences. Therefore, it is a big concern for the researchers and the academicians how the students of Applied Science and Social Science make balance between study and social life. Following this, the purpose of this study is to identify differences in applied science and social science students' participation in laboratory and sociocultural activities, and to explore important factors related to the laboratory environment that promote study-life balance for foreign PhD students. This study is experimental survey based research. In this study, it is found that the students of Applied Science at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) spend more time in lab than Social Science students. In addition, the Applied Science students were found more stressful than Social Science. However, lab pressure negatively influences on the productivity of both disciplines that is the interesting finding in this study. It is also found that internal congenial lab environment (supervisor’s cooperative role, supportive relationship with peers, reasonable work load in lab) influences positively to make balance study-life but the relationship among all these internal lab environment factors are not always found correlated.