WELL-BEING AS A STRENGTH OF SPORTS SCIENCE STUDENTS DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Background. The COVID-19 pandemic worldwide challenged people's mental health. As a tool, physical activity can maintain resilience and well-being. Within this research, we aimed to examine students' well-being in the summer of 2022 and compare them from the perspective of their study programs.Material and methods. This research was carried out in Slovenia and Serbia, with a sample of 700 students from two universities (Primorska and Novi Sad). To evaluate the students' well-being, the PERMA-Profiler, a 15-item self-reported survey, was applied from May to July 2022. The SPSS was used for data analysis of the Mann-Whitney U test.Results. The results revealed normal functioning for the total sample (M=7.47, SD +/- 1.37). In addition, when the researchers were making a comparison between the study programs (sports and other sciences), different responses were found with significantly higher scores attained by the sports science students (M=7.72, SD +/- 1.38) compared to the others (M=7.23, SD +/- 1.31).Conclusions. This research follows the previously published articles about understanding the social consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. The sports science students were less sensitive to changes, and their mental strength demonstrates their successful coping mechanisms for these new circumstances over a more extended period.