For the past several years, according to the World Health Organization, mental disorders approximately account for almost one half of young adults in the United States. There is a great amount of evidence to support the belief that mental health problems are increased more in students that are institutions for higher education. For example, in 2005 there was a national survey done including only undergraduates that showed a great percentage of change in the student psychological thoughts. From that survey, 86% of college students were reported to show an increase in severe psychological problems.
Many mental disorders are first onset during or around the age of 17 or 18 and many of them arise due to stressors from college, like the pressure of academic, extracurricular activities, and many more things. This journal highlights the need for mental health to be address in young adult populations. There was a web-based survey conducted of both graduate and undergraduate student in order to conduct the study. There was a mixture of both male and female, along with there being several different races that took part in the survey. Nonresponse bias was accounted for in this study by there being a brief survey sent out to those who originally did not respond to the first survey. Depression and anxiety were both measured from the PHQ-9 (Patient Health Questionnaire) which put each of them on a scale. Suicidality was measured by the three following questions from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication: has the respondent ever seriously thought about committing suicide, made a plan for committing suicide, or attempted suicide.
Some results from this study show that graduate student students compared to undergraduate were more likely complete the survey, along with females having a higher percentage of completion rate compared to males. Also African American students, according to this research, tended to have a slight lower rate (46.4%) than other groups for a completion rate of the survey. This research lead to many findings like students who grew up in wealthy families tended to report more suicidal thoughts that those students who group up in a comfortable situation.
Another finding is that bisexual students above the other students reported to experience higher levels of mental health problems. One of the biggest findings of this research was that students who grew up in poor families were more likely to screen positive for anxiety disorders, depression, along with having suicidal thoughts. Students that lived with their parents and guardians compared to student the were living off campus and not with their parents showered to be more likely to report suicidal thoughts.
Last but not least, students who were apart of Hurricane Katrina, had close friends or family that was a part of the deathening hurricane were also more likely to show or report suicidal thoughts.