Mental Health of College Students is Getting Worse

According to Jessica Colarossi, that the COVID-19 pandemic affected many college
students, but researchers found no significant increase in reported mental health
problems during the pandemic's semesters. Instead, they saw a continuation of a
concerning trend. over the last eight years, the rate of mental health problems, such
as anxiety and depression, has steadily increased, with rates even higher among
racial and ethnic minority students. It would be an understatement to say that the
college years are a time of significant change; whether you stay at or close to home
or move away to a four-year university, the years following high school are frequently
a time of new experiences, foreign responsibilities, growing pains, and learning
curves. They might also be the first time without parental guidance that some
children have to manage their own physical and emotional health.

According to Sarah K. Lipson, an assistant professor of health law, policy, and

management at Boston University School of Public Health, "college is a vital
developmental phase, and the age of onset for lifetime mental health disorders also
directly aligns with conventional college years." She has been researching the
mental health of college students for more than ten years through the Healthy Minds
Network, a federal initiative she co-directs with academics from Wayne State
University, the University of Michigan, and the University of California, Los Angeles.
According to a recent study by Lipson and her colleagues, mental health problems
such as anxiety, depression, and others are extremely common, and students of
color are particularly affected by them. The study examines survey data gathered
from 350,000 students at more than 300 campuses between 2013 and 2021 by the
Healthy Minds Network. It is the first lengthy, multicampus study of its sort to
examine how racial and ethnic disparities in treatment and prevalence of mental
health problems differ. Lipson and other members of the Healthy Minds Network
team co-authored the paper. Jasmine Morigney, a clinical psychology doctoral
student at Eastern Michigan University and a coauthor on the study, believes that
monitoring these trends supports initiatives relating to stigma reduction and [mental
health] education that can be targeted toward particular communities. The students
self-identified their race and ethnicity, and the researchers used screening tools to
measure mental health symptoms, levels of flourishing, and whether a student
received treatment while in college. With an overall 135 percent increase in
depression and 110 percent increase in anxiety from 2013 to 2021, they discovered
that the mental health of college students nationwide has been declining for all eight
years of data analyzed. The proportion of students who met the criteria for one or
more mental health problems in 2021 had doubled from 2013.

College students were found to have the largest increases in depression, anxiety,
suicidal ideation, and other mental health problems, as well as the largest decreases
in flourishing. As a future teacher, students needs mental health support. Motivation
and act of care is a very big help to them. There should be mental health services in
every college campuses, so students can seek help and reduces their worries, etc.

Reference

https://www.bu.edu/articles/2022/mental-health-of-college-students-is-getting-
worse/?
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