Ever since the recession has started and the economy has taking its downfall, the emotional health of college students has been increasing their stress levels. According to “The American Freshman: National Norms Falls 2010”, about 200,000 college students who are full time students at four year universities rate themselves as “below average” emotionally. In 1985 the percent of students who feel they are above average was 64 percent but has now decreased to 52 percent in the last 26 years. The campus counselors say that college students that have not even started college, are already under stress using psychiatric medication and already emotionally unstable. By the economy, students are even more stressed but not only because of the finical responsibilities of their parents but the debt they will have after college and the need of finding a good job after they graduate.
Brain Van Brunt said that “More students are arriving on campus with problems, needing support, and today’s economic factors are putting a lot of extra stress on college students, as they look at their loans and wonder if there will be a career waiting for them on the other side.” Brunt is the president of American College Counseling Association and director of counseling at Western Kentucky University who sees students like this every day. An interesting fact that caught my attention was that only 18 percent of men say that are overwhelmed with school but 39 percent of women say they are. Women make up 60 percent more of the clients in the mental health services. Perry C. Francis made a good note that, “Boys are socialized not to talk about their feelings of express stress, while girls are more likely to say they’re having a tough time.”
The reason why women are having more stress then men is because while men have downtime, they more likely like to go play sports, exercise while women take more responsibilities like helping out with the family and may even volunteer work.
I enjoyed reading about this article as this made me realize that I am not the only freshman on campus that stresses about school and other things in life. What I found most interesting was how women stress more than men. The question that I have is, will stress level with students going to keep increasing over the years?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/education/27colleges.html?_r=1&ref=education
I thought this post was interesting, since it relates to me directly. Even before coming to college, there was a lot of pressure in high school to get good grades, do well on standardized tests, apply to good colleges, apply for scholarships, etc. Now that I'm here, the stress has only increased. Being away from family, difficult classes, and worrying about money have been really hard on me the last few months.
ReplyDeleteThe point about women making up 60% of the clients in mental health services was interesting. It seems like there is an expectation for men to deal with their own problems, and that getting counseling is kind of like giving in. I wonder if there's anything like that with women, and how that affects counseling client rates?