The mediating role of Covid-19 knowledge level on the effects of university students' anxiety and fear levels on future career concerns during the pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic, spreading rapidly all over the world since its emergence in December 2019, has negatively affected people's lives in many ways: economically, psychologically and socially. During this period, many social restrictions have been implemented in order to reduce the spread of the virus. These practices have deeply affected certain sectors. One of the sectors most affected by the crowd-avoiding and social isolation practices put in place has been the education sector. During this period, students have found themselves in a process they had not experienced before, and many changes have occurred in their lives. After the emergence of the first COVID-19 case in our country, the enforced academic break, which was determined to be temporary, gave way to an indefinite distance education process. Distance education also brought many disadvantages, such as inequality; however, the problems that students have faced during the pandemic period do not only apply to their education, but also the shape that the careers which they have been preparing for have taken, according to the changes in market conditions and uncertainty. Their concerns about the existing career situation have also increased with the problems such as unemployment brought about by the pandemic, the change in the dynamics of work life, and the inability to prepare for their careers due to the lack of education. The purpose of this study is to determine the mediating role of COVID-19 knowledge level on the effects of COVID-19 anxiety and COVID-19 fear levels on the career concerns of undergraduate students studying at public and private universities during the pandemic. Within the scope of the study, health management students were selected as the sample group and a questionnaire was applied to 388 health management undergraduate students. The survey results obtained from the participants were analyzed with the SPSS package program. As a result of the analysis, it was concluded that the increase in the COVID-19 anxiety level and the COVID-19 fear level caused an increase in career anxiety in university students. As a result of the analysis carried out to reveal the mediating role of the COVID-19 knowledge level on career anxiety, it was found that COVID-19 knowledge level caused an increase in the COVID-19 anxiety level and COVID-19 fear levels, leading to an increase in career anxiety, and it was concluded that it had a positive mediating role.