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Taylor Roberts

Professor Cassel

English Composition 1201

10 April 2022

College Students Overwhelmed by Stress

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary says the meaning of stress is “a physical, chemical, or

emotional factor that causes bodily or mental tension” (“Stress”). Any college student would

know this feeling all too well including myself. Ever since I started college in the fall of last

year, I have been put under more stress than I thought could be possible. I underestimated how

hard it can be to work a full-time job while going to school part-time. There are many out there

that can do both just fine, but the weight of my assignments piling up, being understaffed at

work, trying to find time to have a social life, and constantly feeling overworked is pulling me

straight to the ground. If it is something that I am struggling with there has to be more students

that feel the exact same way as myself. There are many stressors that one may feel, but no one

who has ever gone through college would not even have a clue as to what stresses out college

students. The biggest guess would be homework to which they are not wrong, but there is so

much more to it than just the work assigned. College students are put under a tremendous

amount of stress the second they open the door to their new schooling life; they run into

problems such as the cost of college, transitioning to their new life, and the realization of how

much college expects from you academically.

A feeling felt through the mind and the body at the same time would be stress. It grabs a

tight hold of each one leading it to a world many know well. The world of mental health
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problems. There are many in the world who have experienced mental health problems, and know

how much of a toll it can take on your body and mind. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth when

one can realize why their mental health has taken a bad toll. They can link it back to stress

making it worse, then leading that back to the cause of the stress which for many it can be

college. Krysia N. Mossakowski mentions in her article, “How High Stress and Skyrocketing

Tuition Contribute to a Growing Mental Health Crisis on College Campuses”, how much stress

has risen in college students over time. There are more students experiencing mental health

problems that are now wanting to find help. The Center for Collegiate Mental Health conducted

a report finding out that the percentage of students seeking help from 2009 to 2015 has raised to

30% (Mossakowski, 2021). Stress plays a big part in how bad someone’s mental health can get,

and can make their day-to-day life that much harder. Thus, making it a struggle to want to get up

every day to go to the same classes that is causing you that painful stress. College seemingly

seems to get harder academically every year, and can lead to those same statistics reaching new

levels across the campus.

If one had to guess what the cost of tuition was back in 2000, a person’s answer might be

relatively low. Telling someone who went to college during this time how much it costs to go to

college now they would be flabbergasted by the cost of tuition. To go to college now it can cost

anywhere from $40,000-$150,000 to have what everyone calls “the college experience”. It does

not come as cheap as it did back in the 2000’s. Knowing how much it is to go to college it can be

hard to go if one is not financially stable enough. That is of course where scholarships and help

from the state come into play, but it does not cover everything. This will lead to college students

needing to find a part-time job during their school year.

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A student is lead to having to work part-time while going to school full-time. To find the

correct balance between the two is stressful. Knowing that the student cannot stop working

because they are working for their education in two different ways is even more stress upon their

shoulders. This type of stress does not go away if a student is not able to have their college paid

for, and they continually have to work through each school year. A radio show called Talk of the

Nation, received a phone call from a college student named Devon, and he had quite a bit to say

about working and going to school. To summarize his phone call, he mentions how difficult it

can be to manage both a full-time job and going to school. It was a struggle trying to make it to

class or work on time because one of the two would suffer. Suffering in the terms of being late to

class because work went over or being late to work because of class (“Economy Exacerbates

College Students’ Stress”, 2012). The way he talks about balancing the two shows how anxiety

inducing it is to have to do both. It is a beyond stressful experience to have to go through, but too

many college students know this all too well. This is an unavoidable stressor that does not go

away easily. It can take the whole four years of college, finding a job in the career field, and then

paying off student loans to finally lead to getting this stress to go away.
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Fig. 1. Shows how much stress college students are put under by their financial

worries (“23 Eye-Opening College”, 2021)

Finding the balance in college is a step that can be hard to take for many new freshmen.

There is the work and school balance, but there is another factor that comes into play especially

for freshmen. The transition from living with parents to moving out on one’s own. Most students

typically live on campus their freshmen year of college. Many are excited to move out of their

parents’ house so they can live with the no rules and truly be themselves. That all sounds

wonderful in theory, but it is not what it is all that it is hyped up to be. It is nice in the beginning

to be on your own, and be able to experience life by yourself for once. However, the realization

of being away from home and having no one that is familiar around sets in all too quickly. The

ACO Staff Writers in their article, “Cause of Stress in College Students Guide”, mention that

excitement can quickly go away when the feeling of homesickness trickle into their minds. This

feeling causes sadness within young college students (ACO Staff Writers, 2021). That feeling

can wear off with time, but in the moment for however long it lasts can be hard to handle.

Feeling sad can lead to a student being unmotivated to do multiple things when it comes to their

schooling life such as not doing their homework or in extreme cases of sadness going as far as

not going to class anymore. Leading them to being stressed at the same time they are missing

their family and wanting to go back home.

Loneliness can be directly tied to how a college student may feel when the realization of

living somewhere with brand new people and no family are around. It can be hard to have to go

through something with no one physical there to help out. Being a freshman in college is like

being back in kindergarten once again. In each grade level making friends can be either easy if

one is outgoing or it can be extremely difficult if someone’s personality is more of the shy type.
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Trying to not feel so lonely through the next four years of college it is crucial to make friends to

be able to survive. It can be easier to go through the experience with another person who is also

in that same boat. Making friends sounds like an easy task, but can be hard because it can be

easy to get caught up in school and work. Trying to making friends can be a stressful experience

because a student wants to be liked by others. Struggling to achieve that goal can be a hard task

to accomplish for some. This is where having a roommate can make this goal possibly a quick

way to achieve it.

College campuses are known for having dorms to house their students inside ranging

from two to many more people within the room. Going to college most know that one will most

likely share a room with someone else. Not knowing anything about this person can make it a

hard transition from possibly having a room by one’s self at home to having to share the same

space with another person. A bedroom is a safe area that young adults still need to have, but

having to “continually sharing space with a new roommate who doesn’t understand a student’s

need for space or privacy can quickly elevate levels of anxiety” (ACO Staff Writers, 2021).

Having high levels of anxiety going through a body every time they walk into their dorm room is

stressful. Dreading to go back to a room that is supposed to be a safe place can make college life

difficult. Not all go through having bad roommates because some can find life-long best friends

through sharing a space together. Sharing a space can lead to people become closer than ever

before. One may be able to get to this point then that is amazing for them, but if they are not able

to it is a world full of stressful happenings awaiting to occur.

High school is something that happened recently for most or many years ago for some.

No matter what year someone went to high school everyone knows that every single teacher

warned their students about how hard college work can be. The teachers were not kidding about
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the difference between high school level work compared to college level work. There is so much

more that is demanded of a student that it is beyond stressful to have to experience each

semester. The ACO Staff Writers mention that “Some students also experience huge amounts of

anxiety over taking a test; though they may have studied for hours on end and know the material

forwards and backwards, actually sitting down to answer questions about their knowledge can be

a massive source of fear” (ACO Staff Writers, 2021). Wanting to do good in school requires

studying to occur, but having the fear of still not passing the assignment is painful. It is a type of

pain that is frustrating to experience. The need within a student to do well, but the anxiety takes

over all too quickly each time. It is almost like a student is psyching themselves out leading to a

recipe for disaster. Forgetting things that they do know, but when anxiety takes over it can be

hard to do anything about it.

The number of assignments that college students receive is a tremendous amount of

work. They can have anywhere from four to five classes as a full-time student meaning

homework from each class almost every week. That is a lot of work when it starts piling up in

the middle of the semester when the ball gets rolling in each class. It can be hard for a new

college student to get the correct time management down when they are first starting out. There

was more leeway in high school when it came to turning in assignments because it felt like there

was more time between due dates. In college everything is due back-to-back every single week.

Not only this affecting a student, but the amount of work that has to be done within a short time

period is hard to accomplish as well. Having to balance the new workload, having a possible job,

and the new social life is difficult to manage.

College contains many different types of students which are made up of male and

females. The two different genders handle stress in different ways while going through their
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school life. Sue B. Graves and many others from the volume PLoS ONE mention in their article

how the different genders handle the stress they have as college students. Females typically have

more problems relating around doing good on exams, dealing with depression, and handling low

self-esteem. While males do not report having much stress when it comes to these three

categories (Graves, Sue B., et al., 2021). It can be interesting to see what type of stressors are

more likely to affect females going through college compared to their male counterparts. The

authors of the Education volume by Cristin S. Goldman and Eugene H. Wong write about

Zuckerman, who conducted a self-esteem assessment between both genders and found out an

interesting insight to both genders. In the report it was found that women are more likely to share

their feelings when it comes to the problems that are causing them stress, while men will partake

in more activities around them when their stress levels are on the rise. (Goldman, Cristin S., and

Eugene H. Wong, 1997). This shows that males prefer one way to cope with their stress

compared to how a female may cope with her stress. Females seem to be able to express how

they are feeling easier than males are able to, which could explain the difference in their coping

mechanisms.

There is no stress out there in the world that goes without any solution to the problem

causing it. The same goes for the stress students are put under going through college. There are

many ways to help lower stress, and to learn how to cope with the emotion. A common solution

is to just get enough rest in, which is easier said than done. However, getting in the amount of

sleep that an individual’s body needs is important when it comes to college. It allows for the

brain to be more focused throughout the day and ready for any new problems thrown its way. A

second solution is to have some sort of way to let out the stress in the body. The ACO Staff

Writers mention in their work that it is important to have an activity to do when stressed to act as
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an outlet. Taking time to away from a stressor can help the mind focus better later on when

returning to the problem at hand (ACO Staff Writers, 2021). Being able to do an activity that will

help to release the stress in the body is a good feeling to experience because it feels in the

moment like the stress is gone. After calming the body down and going back to the cause of

stress it is like looking at the situation with fresh eyes. Looking at it in a new light could be the

answer that someone was looking for, but could not see it due to the stress clouding their

judgement. Both of these methods are wonderful to use in moments that the body and mind need

a break from stress.

College can be a new amazing experience to go through as a new adult in the world

trying to achieve dream goals. As nice as it is to achieve goals it comes with a load of pressure

on top of it all. A student going through college is bound to experience stress at one point or

many through their new schooling life. Stressors ranging from balancing working a job while

trying to go to school at the same time, the pressure of wanting to do well in school, the new

workload thrown upon a student, trying to transition into the new life, and how much is required

academically from a student now. I am only two semesters into college meaning I am a freshman

trying to get used to all of this happening to me. To say I am stressed out feels like an

understatement to it all. However, there is the end goal in mind and that is graduating from my

major so I can work in my dream career field. That is what makes all of this stress worth it in the

end. College students will always be known to have some sort of stress going on in their lives.

Stress is a struggle that will always find a way to sneak into any situation; a feeling many know

all too well.

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Works Cited

“23 Eye-Opening College Student Stress Statistics for 2021.” What to Become, 16 July 2021,23

Eye-Opening College Student Stress Statistics for 2021 (whattobecome.com). Accessed 2

April 2022.

ACO Staff Writers. “Cause Of Stress In College Students Guide.” Affordable Colleges, 11

November 2021, Causes Of Stress In College Students | Affordable Colleges Online.

Accessed 20 March 2022.

“Economy Exacerbates College Students' Stress.” Talk of the Nation, 21 August 2012, Economy

Exacerbates College Students' Stress - Document - Gale In Context: Opposing

Viewpoints (ohionet.org). Accessed 20 March 2022.

Goldman, Cristin S., and Eugene H. Wong. “Stress and the college student.” Education, vol. 117,

no. 4, summer 1997, pp. 604+. Stress and the college student - Document - Gale In

Context: Opposing Viewpoints (ohionet.org). Accessed 20 March 2022.

Graves, Sue B., et al. “Gender differences in perceived stress and coping among college

students.” PLoS ONE, vol. 16, no. 8. 12 August 2021. Gender differences in perceived

stress and coping among college students. - Document - Gale In Context: Opposing

Viewpoints (ohionet.org). Accessed 20 March 2022.

Mossakowski, Krysia N. “How High Stress and Skyrocketing Tuition Contribute to a Growing

Mental Health Crisis on College Campuses.” Scholars Strategy Network, 7 October 2021.

How High Stress and Skyrocketing Tuition Contribute to a Growing Mental Health Crisis

on College Campuses | Scholars Strategy Network. Accessed 20 March 2022.

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“Stress.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-

webster.com/dictionary/stress. Accessed 7 Apr. 2022.