Is There a Fix to Mental Illness?
If you ask any current college student how their experience at school is going, you are likely to hear about the struggles they face with heavy course materials, difficult exams, and other criticisms about being a student. With that, college students are put under so much pressure that some may not be able to mentally stay on their game and may develop depression and anxiety as a cause of this crazy lifestyle. “Researchers have reported that almost half of college-aged individuals may experience mental health problems” (Jennings). When it comes to receiving help for these developing mental illnesses most universities offer a variety of resources to help students better themselves. These medical resources
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Showing my main arguments to back up this claim will persuade these medical providers that they can in fact can/should change the system us students have to live with today.
Stigma
At some point in our lives every one of us has been going through a tough time only to tell friends and family that you’re “okay”. According to “the web’s top crowd sourced rankings generator, Ranker put together a list of the most popular lies we tell with, “I’m fine” being number one” (Michaels). When you bring college students into the picture, they tend to have specific stigma towards not getting help when they are in distress. When you tie that into help-seeking, most students don’t feel the need to get outside help for their mental problems. Most deal with it themselves as they don’t trust others in fear that they might experience “social consequences associated with treatment” (Jennings). This stigma is common in our universities and some don’t even realize they have a problem to begin with. This now brings the attention to the theory of help-seeking. Psychiatrist Kristen Jennings describes
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“Resources for counseling centers are limited, with an estimated 1 counselor to every 1,459 students” (Levin). Doctor Levin goes on to offer a solution to develop and scale up programs that prevent mental illness before it develops. Education in my opinion is the key to widely spread awareness about everything and anything. Also, “an online prevention program is a cost-effect way to deliver a program across campuses” (Levin). Most students are familiar with these certain kinds of programs as you have to take two separate ones before you start your freshman year at Colorado State. These two programs covered subjects of alcohol abuse and sexual assault. A study was conducted where students at an American university were asked to complete one of two programs that had a concentration in either depression or anxiety. “The sample comprised 234 undergraduate students from a mid-sized university” (Levin). During the three-week long program, researches saw that a huge chunk of the students completing the program gave up at some point before the end. This led researches to believe the programs did not effectively engage the students being tested. “It was unclear whether the results were due to a lack of user engagement” (Levin). This gets me thinking that universities around the country are not effectively getting the attention of the students on the important topic of mental
Mental health among college students has been proven to be a relevant social issue that our society faces. There are certainly a few different institutions that play a large role within the development of this social issue. The first institution, and the primary institution at play with this issue, is the higher education system. In terms of mental health and having access to resources, college students haven’t always been as lucky as they are today. One study in 2007 explains the story of Junior at Syracuse University (Kravets, 3081). Anita Rutman had a history of mental health issues; she even found herself being admitted to a mental health hospital. One morning in February, she threw herself off of the eighth floor of Boland Hall and landed on a patio and fortunately lived. However, her attempt stemmed from the university sending her letter three days prior that informed Anita that the school was planning to dismiss her because of her suicidal tendencies (Kravets, 3081). Anita later sued Syracuse for ten million dollars for malpractice and negligence in handling her condition.
The shutdown of state mental hospitals and lack of available financial and institutional resources force mentally ill people to the United States Judicial System for mental health. Every year thousands of people are arrested for various crimes and they are sent to jail. Sixteen percent of these people have some type of mental health problem (Public Broadcasting System , 2001). When we consider that the United States has the largest incarcerated population in the world at 2.2 million, this number is staggering (Anasseril E. Daniel, 2007). This is about 1% of the entire population of the United States. There are many reasons as to why the situation has taken such a bad turn and when the history of the treatment of mental illness is examined one can see how the situation developed into the inhumane disaster it is today.
Forget all the stereotypes of mental illness. It has no face. It has no particular victim. Mental illness can affect an individual from any background and the black community is no exception. African Americans sometimes experience even more severe forms of mental health conditions because of unmet needs and barriers to treatment. According to the Office of Minority Health, African Americans are 20 percent more likely to experience serious mental health problems than the general population. That’s why UGA third year Majenneh Sengbe is taking action as the co-founder of her upcoming organization Black Minds Daily.
More and more celebrities have been stepping out and telling their story to encourage others to get the help they need. Each year organizations are formed with one purpose in mind; to gain awareness on mental illness in order to break the stigma. But is that enough? With the media exuding this stigma like a parasite slowly affecting its prey.With the news constantly exaggerating these stories beyond their true happenings. With movies using false notions and writing mentally ill off as extreme violence, unbearable depressives, exaggerated perfectionists, or insane narcissists with no in between. It is not enough. No matter how much information and knowledge reaches the population it is immediately crushed by the media of this generation that benefits and profits from these false depictions. This very stigma that is seeping from the media is mentally poisoning those who are actually mentally weak to the degree which they are afraid to get help due to fear of not wanting anyone to know of their condition and being rejected from society. But not getting help overtime can build up hostile feelings which will manifest itself in another light, and often as we have seen in recent news, that light is not very
Things like self-esteem, loneliness, self-doubt, and depression can often be factors some are forced to face (Michael, pg. 61). As it is the second leading cause of death and affects approximately 14.8 million people 18 years old and above, it is no surprise that college and university students are faced with this growing epidemic. According to the American College Health Association’s National College Health Assessment (ACHA-NCHA), the number of students diagnosed with depression had increased over a four-year span. In 2000, the ACHA-NCHA reported 10.3% of students suffering with depression and by 2004 that same time of year, 14.9% reported depression across 74 campuses in the U.S. with a sample size of 47,202.
Students and colleges need to work to break the stigma and spread awareness so that those struggling with mental health problems can get help as soon as they feel their mental health declining and it does not have to get to a point where they feel they cannot handle life. Most colleges have student health services which offer counseling and other help for struggling students but, those students either do not know these services exist or they are too embarrassed to take advantage of
Often times, outside help is needed in order for one to receive the help necessary for getting better. However, this need for help is not always easy to come to terms with. There is a stigma that goes along with the need for help. Society has one believe that asking for help is a sign of weakness. This was apparent in Jim’s journey with his mental illness. When describing his life with depression and anxiety, Jim explained that growing up he was taught not to share his problems with other people. He was taught to pick himself up by the bootstraps and to get over the difficulties he was facing. Therefore, therapy was never even considered. The stigma around getting help makes this still a relevant problem for many individuals today. Many people are afraid to reach out for help because of the fear of sounding crazy if he or she does. There are also many people that do not believe in getting help for the fear of looking weak or incapable of taking control of his or her life. Our society has a very fast past life and expects everyone to be able to keep up. Conversely, research shows that help has more benefits than consequences. It is explained, “Perceived social support is associated with better outcomes in individuals facing stressors. Social support is a robust predictor of resiliency and recovery (Blais, Renshaw & Jakupcak, 2014, p.116).” The stigma around seeking help is creating a barrier for individuals to use the resources necessary to get better. It would be more
Mental health is an invisible but critical component of healthcare in the USA. Studies have found that untreated mental health issues can lead to worse psychiatric outcomes in issues such as psychosis, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorders and major depressive disorders (MDD) (Clement et al., 2014). These worsened outcomes could involve decreased quality of life, impacted social support, and suicide. A major facet in the lack of treatment for mental health issues is the stigma associated with seeking help. To contribute toward the eradication of this stigma, we hope that more discussion about mental health issues could promote more help seeking. Thus, our paper aims to not only explore the science and psychology of developmental psychopathology,
College represents a form of higher learning. For many, it is also a time for personal growth as we transition into adulthood. This in itself is a stressful situation as one must make drastic adjustments to a new role, environment, and demands. Stress is a major contributor to the development of mental and emotional issues (Rodgers, L., Tennison, L. 2009). Research has been done to determine the impact of depression and anxiety on university students. It has been
Thesis: Mental Illness in colleges needs to be addressed because of the rise in college students being diagnosed in mental health problems.
Anxiety and Depression disorders are two of the most common mental disorders in the United States (Falsafi, 2016). It appears that the two disorders are widespread amongst college students and most cannot manage the high demands and stress (Falsafi, 2016). Therefore, they feel more prone to depression and anxiety (Falsafi, 2016). According to the authors Miller & Chung, mental health amongst college students in the United States is a growing public health concern and educators are concerned about the low academic performance of college students and how it influences their mental health (Miller, & Chung, 2009). Research indicates that university students suffer with low grades and poor academic performances, while trying to manage depression and anxiety (Falsafi, 2016). With the consistence of higher drop out rates, it is imperative that colleges and universities create programs that assist students with managing their depression and anxiety to help them through their education.
Depression and anxiety among college students is something that experts have focused on for the past twenty years. The information they have been gathering ranges from the different stressors of college life to the effects of one's culture on how they deal with depression or anxiety symptoms. They have identified a few core characteristics of depression and thoughts of suicide. These are both serious concepts in which people need to seek help for. It is important for students to reach out to friends, family, or professionals to support them during this time. Many campuses offer counseling centers which are seeing many more people over the past few years.
- An increase of 30 percent in caseloads related to students seeking help for mental health issues between 2009 and 2010, and 2014 and 2015 at 93 university counseling centers. These mental health concerns showed prominence in anxiety and mood disorders, and suicidal thoughts, according to the Center for Collegiate Mental Health in 2015.
Another obstacle that threatens success is health and emotional issues present prior to attending school. Fogg (2009) reveals that graduate school has a reputation for triggering and amplifying depression and mental illness, especially in those already afflicted by mental health issues. Depression may prevent the individual from fully engaging in discussions, completing assignments or even reaching one’s full potential. Strategies to overcome these obstacles include complying with prescribed mental health medications, seeking support from the university’s free resource center, and focusing on self-care activities.
Campus mental health statistics paint an alarming picture of the incidence of suicide rates on college campuses and by some measures they are getting worse. Almost one in three students have admitted to considering suicide. Mental health needs on campus are real and serious, they are also growing, which is