# University students’ thriving during remote and in-person instruction in the COVID-19 pandemic: longitudinal evidence from two academic years

## TL;DR

This study explores how university students' personal growth and well-being changed during remote and in-person learning during the pandemic.

## Contribution

The paper provides longitudinal evidence on students' thriving during the pandemic, using a novel statistical approach to track intraindividual changes.

## Key findings

- Students' thriving decreased during remote instruction in winter 2020/2021.
- Thriving increased when in-person instruction resumed in winter 2021/2022.
- Changes in thriving were not influenced by gender or college generation status.

## Abstract

A substantial body of research has demonstrated the negative repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic on university students’ mental health and well-being. Less is known about students’ thriving, defined as a specific sense of personal growth encompassing experiences of vitality and learning.

Using a longitudinal dataset (N = 431) from a large public university in Germany, we examined how students’ thriving developed over the course of two academic years, including five time points from June/July 2020 to February 2022, during which remote instruction (T1–T3), in-person instruction (T4) and again remote instruction (T5) were carried out. To capture intraindividual change, we used two neighbor change models, a subtype of latent change score (LCS) models.

During the period of remote instruction, we found intraindividual decreases in students’ thriving toward T2 in winter 2020/2021. When universities had resumed in-person instruction in winter 2021/2022 (T4), we found intraindividual increases in students’ vitality and learning. Intraindividual changes in thriving toward all later time points did not differ by gender or by college generation status.

We discuss our findings against the background of the study-related stressors that students faced during remote and in-person instruction, as well as the instructional measures implemented by the respective university over the course of the pandemic.