Mental Health Challenges Among College Students

Mental health affects how we feel, think and act. It’s part of our emotional, psychological and social wellbeing. Over time, if a person experiences mental health problem, their way of thinking, emotions and behavior can change. Mental health isn’t all about negatively; it can be positive. However, many people’s mental health is negative and affects their physical state.

Mental health is important, and we need to take care of it as if it’s our own body. Many people don’t see mental health in the way.

Stigma affect people’s view of mental health. One common stigma is that mental illness is only for crazy people. The more we neglect our mental state, the more our physical state may be affected.

College is a new environment for most people, new people, new places, new experiences. College could be the best and the worst of times for many students.

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When considering mental health, college is the worst time for many students. According to Gruttadaro, 2012, over 73% of college students in the United States are suffering from a mental health crisis. There are various things that could have triggered student’s crisis. Students can experience severe feelings of depression, anxiety about school, new routine and environment, feeling alone and stressed. These same students don’t know how to properly handle the mental health issues. Students tend to hide their emotions in unhealthy ways like drugs, drinking alcohol and self-harm.

I believe mental health affects the performance of college students and college affects the mental health of college students.

Many students are struggling with mental health problems every day.

The major types of mental illness they suffer from depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety and prescription drug abuse

Depression is a mood disorder that can cause sadness and loss of interest and passion for the things you once loved. Depression can affect how you feel, think and act. Depression can either happen once in your life or multiple episodes can occur, symptoms can be present most of the day or every day. There are multiple symptoms for depression. It can cause people to feel sad, empty and hopeless. Random outburst of anger, irritability and frustration occur no matter how big or small the problem. It can also cause loss of pleasure, lack of sleep or sleeping all day, lack of energy, reduced or increased appetite, feeling of inadequacy, and suicidal thoughts. No one knows what cause depression, there could be many factors. One of the causes is biological differences. Depression can cause physical changes in people’s brains. It can cause changes in the function of neurotransmitters and how they interact with neural circuits involved with mood stability. Changing of amounts of hormones in the body can cause depression. Depression can be genetic. There are risk factors that could trigger depression. Some of these factors are certain personality traits, traumatic events, genetics, sexual orientation and chronic illness.

Anxiety is excessive worrying that is difficult to control and interfere with your daily activities. Symptoms of anxiety include constant worrying, overthinking things, difficulty handling doubt, indecisiveness, inability of letting go and having a hard time concentrating. Physical signs of anxiety are fatigue, trouble sleeping, muscle tension, twitchy, nervousness and irritability. Some of the causes of anxiety are alterations in brain chemistry, genetics and the way threats are being seen. The risk factors are a person’s personality. For example, if someone is timid, negative, or avoids dangerous situations, they could have anxiety. It can be genetic. Experiences that causes big changes in your life that could be traumatic or negative could trigger anxiety.

Bipolar disorder is a mental health condition that can cause extreme mood swings such as marked emotional highs and lows. Bipolar 1 disorder, a person has at least one manic episode followed by hypomanic or major depressive episodes. Bipolar 2 disorder, least one depressive episode and hypomanic episode occur but never a manic episode. Mania and hypomania are different types of episodes but have same symptoms (mayo clinic). These symptoms include feeling upbeat, euphoria, poor decision making and no need for sleep. The symptoms for major depressive episode include loss of interest, fatigue, feeling worthlessness and suicidal thoughts. One cause of bipolar disorder is changes in neurotransmitters in the brain. Bipolar disorder can be genetic and it’s more common if a parent or sibling has it. The risk factors are genetic, stress, and drug or alcohol abuse.

Prescription drug abuse is the use of a prescription medication that in a way that has not been prescribed. Prescription drug abuse can be taking someone's prescription painkillers in order to get high. The drugs are usually opioid painkillers, anti-anxiety, sedatives and stimulants. Prescription drug abuse can be turned into an addiction. Signs that a person is using opioids is feeling high, confusion, poor coordination and slowed breathing. Anti-anxiety and sedatives abuse signs are drowsiness, slurred speech, memory problems and more. Signs of stimulant abuse include increased alertness, feeling high, irregular heartbeats and high blood pressure. Signs of prescription drug abuse is stealing someone’s prescriptions, taking more of the prescription than you should, and getting prescriptions from other doctors. People tend to abuse drugs for many reasons. They want to feel good, relax, and improve concentration and academic.

Mental health issues have been a problem for many college students. Students tend to struggle with anxiety, depression and stress. According to Pedelll et al 2015, college stresses can cause students to change their appetite, have a hard time focusing and develop depression. Students have a hard time focusing on their assignments because they either over think the work; or they not motivated to do the assignments. Academics are important to college students. They become stressed if they don’t have a healthy attitude toward their goal. According to Bruffaerts 2017, studies show that students with mental disorders are twice as likely to drop out of college. Mental disorders have a negative impact on academics, and it affects between 15 and 23% of college students. There’s an association between mental health issues and academic performance in college. Depression and suicidal thoughts are correlated with lower grades. The journal Bruffaerts, 2017 use Global Appraisal of Individual Needs Short Screener (GAIN-SS) to provide a quick and accurate screening for emotional and behavioral problems. They tested students for internalizing mental health issues (depression, anxiety), externalizing (hyperactivity, acting out) and substance abuse. The grades of students with mental health issues grades decrease over the year compared to student that doesn’t have mental disorder. Study showed that emotional problems have an association with lower academic functioning. Freshmen with externalizing problems had a negative affect with academics. Academic programs may increase student distress and lead to higher mental health problems and lower academic functioning (Bruffaerts et al, 2017).

According to Nourse et al 2017, about 39% to 44% of students binge drink in their sample size of 201 students. The study showed that binge drinking has the most negative and harmful issues and could lead to sexual assault, physical injuries, hangover, blacking and passing out. It can affect students’ academics such as grades, dropping out and being expelled. Binge drinking can change a student’s behavior or emotion. They can become more aggressive or develop anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts. It been report that 1.2% to 1.5% of students attempt suicide while under the influence (Nourse et al, 2017). According to Nourse, some students drink to cope with emotional issues such as depression, stress, anxiety or suicidal thoughts. Students believe it’s normal to feel depressed or anxious in college. Students that drink heavy alone has a higher chance of attempted suicide. 29.4% of students experienced depression before they started to drink alcohol, 14.9% felt less depressed. 8.5% felt that drinking made their depression worse and 15.9% felt that drinking makes them feel better. 36.3% of students had suffered with anxiety before they ever start drinking alcohol. 13.4% felt anxious after drinking alcohol. 8% felt that drinking made their anxiety worse and 18.9% felt that drinking made their anxiety better. The 7 item Generalized Anxiety Questionnaire assessment tool (GAD7) reveal that 45.3% of students experienced mild anxiety symptoms, 29.4% is moderate and 25% have severe anxiety. The 9 item Patient Health Questionnaire assessment tool (PHQ-9) use for depression revealed that 58.7% of students have mild depressive symptoms, 23.9% moderate and 17.4% with severe depression. The more students spent on academics, they have worse moods, more tired and drink less (Greene and Maggs 2016).

According to Beiter 2015, the Franciscan University counseling center had an increase of 173% in yearly clients. The main mental health issues those students suffered from are anxiety, depression and stress. Students tend to look at getting a degree as a goal to success. Students leaves their home state or city to attend college. Being away from home can cause students to become anxious, depressed and stressed. Students with poor sleeping habits can have a negative impact on academic performance. Depression can have students to smoke, drink, eat poorly and terrible sleep schedule. Students that live off campus tend to feel more stressed, anxious and depressed than students that live on campus. They must worry about paying rent and cost of food. Transfer students have the highest level of depression, stress and anxiety due to being in a new environment. Seniors also have the highest levels because they must worry about their plans after graduating college.

College can cause a change of eating habits, hard time focusing, depression and anxiety. Since mental health and physical health are related, if a student mental health has a poor mental health, they can have a poor physical health (Toussaint et al 2016). It can cause chronic pain and nausea. If a student is physically sick, it would be harder for them to focus on their assignments. Academics are important to college students and it can cause the student to become stress if they don’t meet their goal. They are anxious about meeting their grade requirement in order to move on to the required class. If they were to fail the class, it can cause an increase of negative feelings. The pressure of learning new class material in a limited time can cause a student stress.

Students tend to suffer from mental health issues every day. Most students don’t receive professional help because they don’t feel comfortable going to a stranger about their mental health issues. Most students feel comfortable talking to a friend or family member about the way they are feeling.

Another reason why students feel like they can’t get help because they believe that the school doesn't care nor the mental health services at their school aren’t supported. Most colleges can’t help their students in their time of need. It has been reported that students are not able to see a therapist because there is not enough to help him.

The main reason why students don’t receive the help they need because of stigma. People’s stigma tends to get in the way of them getting real help. Stigma is a negative stereotype a person can have about them self or someone else about mental illness. There’s perceived stigma is the person’s belief about others’ mental illness while personal stigma is a person’s own views on themselves. Stigma is also prejudice and discrimination about mental illnesses (Eisenberg 2009). Students don’t seek help because of the ear of personal stigma and the lack of time (Pedrelli et al 2015). Stigma, embarrassment and problems recognizing symptoms have been reported as barriers to mental health treatments (Ebert at el, 2018).

Many students don’t want to receive help because they want to avoid being labeled. They felt like if they went to seek help, they will feel inadequate (Kosyluk et al, 2016). Students reasons of barriers of treatment because they want to handle it on their own, they are too embarrassed and/ or they would rather talk to their friends or family (Ebert at el, 2018)

People reported to be embarrassed to be associated with mental health treatment are less likely to receive mental health services. One in four people don’t seek mental health services because they are concerned about how others might think of them (Eisenberg et al 2009).

According to Ebert et al 2018, the authors did a web- based self-reported survey across the world and the results were only 24.6% of students would get treatment in the future if they are going to an emotional problem, 56.4% rather handle it on their own and 48% rather talk to their loved ones. Students hesitant to seek help because of stigma.

Impact of Mental Health on Academic Performance

Students’ mental health issues affect academic performance and the stresses of college life affect the students’ mental health. Since students are struggling with their mental health issues, their grades drop, and they don’t feel motivated to do their assignments. Students tend to drop out of college because it causes them depression, anxiety and stress. College students has a lot on their plate to worry about in school. They must worry about financial situation, the new environment and post-graduation plans. Some students suffer in silence because they don’t know how to talk about their feelings. If they do know how to talk about their emotions, they rather not talk about them. Some students believe that it’s normal to feel depressed and stress in college. They have this stigma that makes them believe that their feelings are not valid. Their mental health gets worse to the point that they must drop out or attempt suicide. Students around the world are suffering rom a mental illness but many don’t want to get help. They rather handle on their own because of the fear of being label. If they were to get proper mental health treatment, the feeling of depression, anxiety and stress would decrease.

Students rather binge drink than get mental health treatment. Some students believed that drinking would make them feel less depressed and if they focus on their assignments it makes them feel more depressed. If the student drink alone, there’s a high chance that they will attempt suicide.

Conclusion

I believe that college students with mental health issues do not receive the help they need because of stigmas and lack of awareness of the school's resources. For my project two, I will make a survey for Harrisburg University (HU) students to learn if they had experience in mental health crisis while being a student at HU. Before I get the survey started, I have to get IRB approved since this is a study on humans. I will ask the students about their mental health and see if they have a stigma towards mental illness. If the students know about the mental health services, is it helpful or terrible. I will ask the student questions like ‘have you experience a mental health crisis? If so whom do you talk to? Do you use the HU mental health service?’ I will also ask if they are aware of our services, what barriers are keeping them from getting help. My simple size will be at least 100 students. I wonder how’s the student’s mental health since being at HU and if they are willing to get treatment or not if they are suffering from a mental health crisis.

I will also speak with student services about our mental health service. I will ask how they let students know about the resources and how often do students come to receive help. I wonder how they let the students feel safe. If HU has enough counselors to speak with the students who go to them for help or do students have to be waitlisted to speak with a counselor.