More Inclined Towards Education: Research Paper on The Impact on Society

Introduction

The current society has become more inclined towards education. As a result of this issue, education plays a major role in how many things are done. This factor has brought a shift into society as more people have developed the urge to purse education to greater levels. In this case, the number of people going into colleges and other institutions of learning has significantly increased over the past few years. People who have gone to college tend to be accorded more respect than those who have not gone at all. As much as going to college is perceive to be a good step towards gaining higher-level education, there are many problems that are coupled within it. Most of these problems may become worse to the extent of affecting the studies of the individuals faced by it. According to recent research, it is evident that one of the main problems that are present in various colleges is mental health issues. The number of college students faced with mental health problems has increased because most of them do not seek help or they are not aware of them. With this matter in mind, this paper will discuss mental health in college, its causes and how it can be dealt with effectively.

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Mental Health Problems Affecting Students in Colleges

Depression

Mental health in college has been deteriorating in the past few years due to the different experiences and activities that learners undergo. One of the mental health problems that are present in many colleges is depression. Depression among many college students comes in different forms. Majority of the students in college experience some level of depression. According to Hunt and Eisenberg (8), most of the drop out cases of students in college are attributed to the rising levels of depression. If the case is not dealt with immediately, it may lead to worse outcomes such as suicide. One of the main causes of depression in colleges is social status. In different colleges, students come from different backgrounds, whereby some of them belong to the privileged background, while others are less privileged. The students from the less privileged background may have the pressure of keeping up with those that are from privileged families. This pressure may result in depression if these students realize that they cannot keep up with the lifestyle of others. The other cause of depression colleges is too much work. Some of the students are given too much which they cannot accomplish and submit within the required time (Eisenberg, Hunt and Speer 302). These students are likely to be depressed due to the presence of too much work that they cannot handle. Some of the symptoms that may indicate the presence of depression in college students include the change in eating habits, sleeping patterns, sadness, and trouble paying attention.

Anxiety

The second mental health issue present in college is anxiety. Many students in college are likely to experience low levels of stress and anxiety while carrying out their daily activities (Eisenberg, Hunt, and Speer 304). This issue cannot be considered an anxiety disorder. However, this feeling will be considered to be an anxiety disorder when it affects the normal activities of a college student. The main factor that contributes to the occurrence of anxiety among college students is stress. Stress in college students tends to occur due to exams. Some of the signs of anxiety include stress, irritability, irregular heartbeat, muscle pain and tension, fear fullness and headache.

Eating Disorder

Eating disorder is the third mental health issue that is evident in many colleges. Most men and women develop their eating disorders while they are in college. Most of the affected people do not realize their problems or do not seek help (Eisenberg, Nicklett, and Roeder 700). The main factor that is likely to influence college students to develop eating disorders is stress which develops from various factors. Some of the symptoms that may show the presence of an eating disorder in a person include dehydration, excessive exercise, eating without control and fear of eating in public.

Addiction

Addiction is the fourth mental health problem that is seen among many college students. Due to the stress that college students are likely to encounter in the process of their studies, there is a high chance that most of them may opt for alcohol and other drugs. Alcohol, as well as drug abuse, has become rampant in many colleges. The use of these substances starts with a single try and within a short time, one has become an addict. According to Wang, Chen, Chen, Li, and Harari (78), 25% of the student who drinks while in college attribute their reason for drinking to academic problems. The addiction that comes along with the consumption of alcohol will have a negative impact on the outcome of the college student as they may end up producing dismal performance.

Suicide

Also, suicide is the fifth mental health issue that most of the college students face. Suicide refers to the act of ending one's life deliberately. According to Wang et al. (79), suicide is currently the leading cause of death in colleges. Various stressors influence the urge to commit suicide by many students in schools such as too much work or the pressure to perform well. There are no clear signs of suicide, as this varies from one person to another. However, some of the common warnings of suicide may appear in the way that a person speaks, the behavior or the mood.

Addressing Mental Health Problems in Colleges

It is evident that mental health in college is deteriorating gradually and a lot of students are affected; hence they cannot complete their education successfully. The presence of this problem calls for a speedy action that would protect more college students from becoming victims of mental health issues. As a result, several approaches can be used to address the mental health problems among college students.

Creating Awareness

Creating awareness to the students once they join colleges will go a long in addressing some of the mental health problems. Increase awareness helps the students to understand some of the factors or experience that that may go through, thus resulting in mental health problems (Storrie, Ahern, and Tuckett 4). As the student will be pursuing their studies, they will be aware of the risk factor of mental health. Therefore, the students will understand how to deal with some of these issues to reduce the risk of developing mental health problems.

Conducting Free Mental Health Screening

Conducting free mental health screening is an important approach to addressing mental health problems. Most of the mental health issues that most of the college students are suffering from are not identified early or at all. Most of these issue starts to be seen after it has reached an advanced stage (Storrie, Ahern, and Tuckett 6). Therefore, it is essential that mental health screening should be performed on college students at no cost. The screening will help to identify the mental health issue that the students could be suffering from and help in providing information on the right course that can be taken to deal with it.

Campus-Wide Initiatives

Various campus-wide initiatives and programs may be developed to help students suffering from various mental health conditions. An example of a program that can be developed is online training resilience tools. These tools train the students to easily bounce back after they have experienced negative experiences in life (Fink 385). All the students should be trained with such tools so that they can be able to rise again after experience various mental health problems and not give up.

Talking About It

Mental health problems can be easily solved by talking about it. Talking about one's experience and the problem may help others to understand what you are going through. In this case, it will be easy to get help for the issue. Through talking, a student may found out there are others who are going through a difficult situation than theirs. This approach will help the students to come together and find a way that may enable them to come up with a solution to the problem.

Well-Being Practices Introduced Into Course work

Apart from course work, college instructors, as well as proffers, should find a way of introducing well-being practices within their programs. These strategies will help the students to learn some of the measures they can undertake for wellbeing through modeling the preventive strategies as well as the coping skills within the class. For example, professors in colleges can spare a few minutes of each class and train the students on how to deal with various situations.

Choosing the Right College

Choosing the right college may play an important role in preventing mental health issues. Some of the colleges that have been developed are based on the social class. Some colleges support students from rich backgrounds only. Therefore, students should ensure that when selecting colleges, they chose the one that will support their lifestyle. In this case, the students will have avoided the pressure that comes with a lifestyle that cannot fit in which is one of the main causes of mental health problems.

Conclusion

Concluding, Even though colleges have been created for providing higher education to the student, not everyone gets out of it successful. In many colleges, there are different experiences as well as activities that affect the student in various ways which could be either positive or negative. In the past few years, credible research suggests that mental health has been a major issue among many college students. Some of the mental issues that this research has discovered include depression, anxiety, eating disorder, addiction and suicide. All these mental health problems tend to occur to stressors such as too much schoolwork or the failure to fit into a certain lifestyle. Since the number of students with mental health issues is high, it has become difficult for most of them to accomplish their studies. Proper approaches have to be undertaken to address this matter so that the student can complete their studies effectively. Some of the approaches identified in this research include creating awareness, mental health screening, talking about mental problems, choosing the right college and introducing well-being practices into course work. The main recommendation is that these actions should be observed thoroughly to ensure cases of mental health are reduced in colleges.

Works Cited

Eisenberg, Daniel, et al. "Eating disorder symptoms among college students: Prevalence,persistence, correlates, and treatment-seeking." Journal of American Health 59.8(2011): 700-707.

Eisenberg, Daniel, et al. "Mental health service utilization in college students in the UnitedStates." Journal of mental disease 199.5 (2011): 301-308.

Fink, John E. "Flourishing: Exploring predictors of mental health within the collegeenvironment." Journal of American College Health 62.6 (2014): 380-388.

Hunt, Justin, and Daniel Eisenberg. "Mental problems and help-seeking behavior incollege students." Journal of adolescent mental health 46.1 (2010): 3-10.

Storrie, Kim, Kathy Ahern, and Anthony Tuckett. "A systematic review: students with mentalhealth problems-a growing problem." Journal of nursing practice 16.1(2010): 1-6.

Wang, Rui, et al. "Student Life: assessing mental health, academic performance, and behavioraltrends of college students using smartphones." Proceedings of the 2014 ACMconference on pervasive and ubiquitous computing. ACM, 2014.