A study yesterday in Frontiers shows that university students experienced increased psychological distress during COVID-19 but used fewer mental health support services. This is the first known study to use a national dataset to compare use of mental health services pre- and post-pandemic.
More U.S. college students suffered from mental health concerns during the pandemic, but fewer received necessary mental health treatment.
“More U.S. college students suffered from mental health concerns during the pandemic, but fewer received necessary mental health treatment,” said first study author Elaine Russell, from George Mason University’s College of Public Health, in a press release from that school.
The findings were based on data from fall 2019, early spring 2020, and spring 2021 surveys. Participants were limited to full-time undergraduate students aged 18 to 24 attending four-year universities in the United States. A total of 88,986 completed the National College Health Assessment before the COVID-19 pandemic, and 96,489 completed it during the pandemic.
High levels of stress during pandemic
The participants were given a survey to assess mental health, stress, and loneliness, and asked how and if they accessed on-campus mental health services. Across all measures, mental health was worse in 2021 compared to 2019 and 2020. Of note, rates of students suffering from severe psychological distress increased from 19.0% pre-pandemic to 26.8% in spring 2021.
“During the peak of COVID-19, 82.4% of students reported experiencing moderate to high stress over the past 30 days, compared to 75.8% pre-COVID-19, which was also found to be statistically significant,” the authors wrote.
Due, in part, to campus shutdowns, students’ rates of on-campus use of mental health services decreased from 58.6% to 44.4%, and rates of using services in the local community near campus decreased from 24.8% to 21.9%.
Non-White and male students were less likely to use mental health services after the pandemic began compared to female students.
“This research study is important in helping to identify students who were at the greatest risk of psychological distress and least likely to access necessary mental health services,” the authors concluded.
