Introduction:

throughout the last year, the population has suffered the emotional and psychological consequences of COVID-19 pandemic. University students, as well, had to modify their routines and to adapt themselves to a new teaching modality.

Objective:

to identify the incidence of COVID-19 pandemic on the manifestation of academic stress in university students.

Materials and methods:

a cross-sectional, descriptive study was carried out in a universe composed by 359 students from Ecuadorian universities. The socio-demographic card and SISCO Academic Stress Inventory were used for data collection.

Results:

Female sex and the age group from 18 to 20 years predominated in students from several universities of Republic of Ecuador. 66.01 % of the university students reported academic stress with indicators of Almost always and Always; the most frequent stressor was task overload (x = 4.08); the most suffered symptom was concentration troubles (x = 3.55); and the most used strategy was listening to music and distracting watching television (x = 4.00).

Conclusion:

a high percent of university students showed academic stress, being identified its relationship to COVID-19 pandemic in this population.

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