Supporting Mental Health on College Campuses
The Big Problem
Imagine this: it’s one in the morning in the middle of finals season, and you’re staring at a blinking cursor on your laptop screen, struggling through a haze of mental fog and physical fatigue to crank out an essay before the morning deadline. You know you should probably talk to someone about your burnout, but the counseling center has a two-month wait list—and you’re not even sure your anxiety is severe enough to justify formal therapy. The few campus wellness workshops you attended offered no real solutions for managing the crushing academic pressure you’re facing. So, like many of your peers, you stick it out alone, running on caffeine and sheer willpower to get through the school year.
This trend is becoming an increasing concern for senior campus administrators and mental health service designers. Today’s college students are feeling more burnt-out, anxious, and depressed than ever before, with many considering dropping out due to escalating emotional stress and mental health concerns.1 Despite mental health challenges being at an all-time high, many students are not getting the help they need.2 Although several institutions are actively scaling up their counseling centers, a nationwide shortage of mental health practitioners means universities often lack the staffing needed to meet the rising demand.3 Others have expanded their approach beyond formal counseling with peer support programs and mental health apps, but many students either don’t know about these resources or don’t feel they apply to their situation.
The missing link in many of these approaches is behavior change. Focusing on the factors that drive human decision-making can help us introduce interventions that students will actually use and benefit from. By building these interventions around a bedrock of behavioral science, we can encourage the adoption of novel mental health approaches, empower students to acquire the support they deserve, and promote new norms around help-seeking behavior. Below, we’ll discuss these groundbreaking initiatives and explore how behavioral science could help get the ball rolling for universities and service designers intent on improving student mental health.
TL;DR
- College students are facing a mental health crisis where the rising demand for care and limited traditional support options require multifaceted solutions beyond simply hiring more counselors.
- Next-generation mental health treatment models, such as stepped care, offer scalable solutions to counselor shortages through tailored support, matching students to different care levels based on their individual needs.
- Resilience programs can provide a proactive solution to help students hone their sense of self-efficacy, manage stress, and better cope with mounting academic and financial pressures.
- Mental health education and peer-led initiatives can help students overcome biases that contribute to stigma, normalizing mental health care and encouraging help-seeking across all groups.
References
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- The Wiley Network. (2024, February 27). The student mental health landscape: Mental health challenges, evolving preferences, and the need for more support. Wiley. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/network/trending-stories/the-student-mental-health-landscape
- Abrams, Z. (2022, October 1). Student mental health is in crisis: Campuses are rethinking their approach. American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/monitor/2022/10/mental-health-campus-care
- Lipson, S. K., Zhou, S., Abelson, S., Heinze, J., Jirsa, M., Morigney, J., Patterson, A., Singh, M., & Eisenberg, D. (2022). Trends in college student mental health and help-seeking by race/ethnicity: Findings from the national healthy minds study, 2013–2021. Journal of Affective Disorders, 306, 138-147. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2022.03.038
- Lipson, S. K., Kern, A., Eisenberg, D., & Breland-Noble, A. M. (2018). Mental health disparities among college students of color. Journal of Adolescent Health, 63(3), 348-356. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2018.04.014
- Colby, E. (2023, December 12). Mental health practitioners seeing increasing number of patients, experiencing burnout. Wiley. https://newsroom.wiley.com/press-releases/press-release-details/2023/Mental-Health-Practitioners-Seeing-Increasing-Number-of-Patients-Experiencing-Burnout/default.aspx
- Staff to student ratios. IACS. (n.d.). https://iacsinc.org/staff-to-student-ratios/
- Gass-Poore, J. (2024, February 21). As more students seek mental health services, college counseling centers struggle to hire staff. Fort Worth Report. https://fortworthreport.org/2024/02/21/as-more-students-seek-mental-health-services-college-counseling-centers-struggle-to-hire-staff/
- Franx, G., Oud, M., de Lange, J., Wensing, M., & Grol, R. (2012). Implementing a stepped-care approach in primary care: results of a qualitative study. Implementation science, 7(8). https://doi.org/10.1186/1748-5908-7-8
- LaLonde, L., Good, J., Orkopoulou, E., Vriesman, M., & Maragakis, A. (2022). Tracing the missteps of stepped care: Improving the implementation of stepped care through contextual behavioral science. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science, 23, 109-116. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcbs.2022.01.001
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- Weiner, S. (2022, August 9). A growing psychiatrist shortage and an enormous demand for mental health services. AAMCNews. https://www.aamc.org/news/growing-psychiatrist-shortage-enormous-demand-mental-health-services
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- March-Amengual, M., Badii, I. C., Casas-Baroy, C., Altarriba, C., Company, A. C., Pujol-Farriols, R., Baños, E., Galbany-Estragués, P., & Cayuela, A. C. (2022). Psychological Distress, Burnout, and Academic Performance in First Year College Students. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(6), 3356. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19063356
- Paudel, U., Parajuli, A., Shrestha, R., Kumari, S., Adhikari Yadav, S., & Marahatta, K. (2024). Perceived stress, sources of stress and coping strategies among undergraduate medical students of Nepal: a cross-sectional study. F1000Research, 11, 167. https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.75879.3
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- Thejll-Madsen, T., Murzyn, E., & Banas, K. (2021, July 15). An evidence-based intervention to support students’ transition into hybrid learning at university. The University of Edinburgh. https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/teaching-matters/an-evidence-based-intervention-to-support-students-transition-into-hybrid-learning-at-university/
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- Stigma, prejudice and discrimination against people with mental illness. American Psychiatric Association. (n.d.). https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/stigma-and-discrimination
- Omar, R. M., Ahmed, S. K., & Haji, R. M. (2024). Attitudes of university students towards people with mental health disorders: A survey-based study. Discovery Psychology, 4(97). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44202-024-00220-8
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- Mowreader, A. (2024, January 9). College students provide mental health education to peers. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/student-success/health-wellness/2024/01/09/six-models-peer-support-college-campuses
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About the Author
Kira Warje
Kira holds a degree in Psychology with an extended minor in Anthropology. Fascinated by all things human, she has written extensively on cognition and mental health, often leveraging insights about the human mind to craft actionable marketing content for brands. She loves talking about human quirks and motivations, driven by the belief that behavioural science can help us all lead healthier, happier, and more sustainable lives. Occasionally, Kira dabbles in web development and enjoys learning about the synergy between psychology and UX design.
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