Running head: LITERATURE REVIEW 1

Mental Health in University Students: A Literature Review

Anna Christina Fernandez

The University of Texas at El Paso

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Abstract

Mental health is a topic that is now very known. The stigma that mental health is not

something serious has majorly decreased. Therefore many people are reaching out about their

own problems. There are counseling centers and healthcare professionals that are considered the

most qualified and trained to help resolve these problems. Many youths, according to numerous

studies are the affected most by this problem, especially college students. There are many

stressors in not only school but work and family life as well. This literary review is intended to

look into the problems of mental health over time and how well students know about services

offered in their university and whether or not they take advantage of these services. Through this

literary review, it is found out that there are many programs offered through larger counseling

centers and the reasons why people dont receive treatment for their mental health issues.
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Mental Health in University Students: A Review of Literature

Mental health has become a prevalent and more serious topic around the world nowadays.

It affects people of all ages in different types of ways for many different reasons. The stigma

surrounding mental health problems has decreased over the years; therefore more people have

reached out about their problems. There are now counseling centers, support groups, and more

healthcare facilities one can go to. Though there are more services to aid a person with their

mental health, people still have problems with it, especially university students. The many

stressors accompanied by school life and the fast paced society students are growing up in

contribute to the many mental health problems they face. It is not really known how many

students deal with a mental health problem like depression or anxiety at the University of Texas

at El Paso campus since it is not really possible to ask every single individual about whether or

not they have a mental health problem. That is why there are places like the counseling center

one can go to if they wanted to get help or just need someone to talk to. There are many

professionals that are trained for these specific issues but there are also other professionals, like

anthropologists who are not the typical kind of people one would think of to help a person with

mental health issues. The diverse skills these anthropologists have though, can actually

contribute to understanding why these mental health issues exist and how they can be treated.

A literature review will be conducted to examine mental health issues at a college level

by asking four research questions. These questions will help make the purpose of our literature

review clearer by exploring the programs used for mental health and whether or not these

programs are taken advantage of. The four research questions are as follows.

How have services for mental health changed over time?

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How does mental health differ from other races?

Are students with mental health problems aware of services at their university and are

those services taken advantage of or are they useful?

Do anthropologists play any role in helping with a persons mental health?

How have services for mental health changed over time?

Over the years, programs for mental health issues have increased in both size and quality.

Mental health is now taken more seriously and is not thought of as an irrational thing (Tsao

2009). Mental health has become more of a problem among college students due to the stressors

of school life. Nowadays, college students are growing up in a very fast paced society.

Therefore, there is an ever-growing demand for mental healthcare services in many universities

because the stigma surrounding mental health has decreased according to a video by PBS

NewsHour (2015). In the video, they state that there is more awareness of problems, risks, and

diagnosis (0:30). The services for mental health in universities are trying to find out how to best

treat their students. Now, more than ever, students are coming forward to receive help with their

mental health problems. There are numerous amounts of resources available to students through

counseling programs, support groups, and seminars.

Many university counseling centers are receiving students with a number of mental health

issues. Anxiety, stress, and depression are the number one problems students now have while

attending college (Jibeen 2016). This comes from trying to balance social, work, and home life

while living in a fast paced society (p. 1). Jibeen claims that these mental health problems have a

negative impact on a students academic success and quality of life. In Jibeens article, she found
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out that issues with family and peers play the biggest role in determining if a student will

develop stress, anxiety, or depression.

Students not only have school to stress about but home and work life as well. Most

students now work to help support their family and pay for their college tuition while still

attending school (Jon Wakeford 2017). Compared to earlier years where students in college did

one or the other, we can see that a combination of these factors contribute to mental health

changing over time. Wakeford claimed that 9 in 10 students report it is hard to cope with

academic and financial aspects of college life (para. 2). The combination of going to school and

having a job creates a lot of pressure which can develop into stress. More programs have now

been created to target these specific issues. The University of Texas at El Paso offers many

services that help with these certain issues. They have a counseling center that has psychotherapy

services so that a student may come in and speak to someone about what their problems are.

They also have an abundant amount of self-help online resources if a student might be weary or

ashamed to speak to someone in person.

How does mental health differ from other races?

Different races deal with mental health problems in different ways. There are different

ways to approach treatment for other races. According to Manuel Casas (2009), every race does

things a different way and believes in different ways of doing them. (p. 11). He notes that

clinicians, counselors, or whoever is treating a patient with mental health issues must change

their perspective and see the world from their point of view.
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As Casas claimed that counselors need to change their approach for treating different

patients, Joseph Westermeyer (1976), have a similar agreement that cultural factors matter

because they are crucial to the diagnosis, treatment, and care of mental health issues. In image

one; it is seen that Hispanic, Whites, and American Indians have a higher percentage of mental

illnesses. This makes us think why these particular races have more mental health problems than

other races. There could be a multitude of reasons and background information that could affect

the way a professional would treat the patient. That is why counselors or other professionals

treating a mental health issue must use a diverse approach for these diverse people.

Image 1-Source: NIH (2015). Prevalence of Serious Mental Illness Among U.S Adults.

Retrieved from https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/prevalence/serious-mental-illness-

smi-among-us-adults.shtml

Are students with mental health problems aware of services at their university and are

those services taken advantage of or are they useful?

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With the many different resources available to help with mental health problems, it is

wondered whether or not students know about them. Terje Ogden and Kristine Hagen (2014),

claim that individuals dealing with critical mental health issues need to seek professional help.

Some health problems can be treated or improved with self-help strategies but some other health

problems require the help of a professional. Getting up the courage to talk in person to a

counselor, for example, might be a really hard thing for a student to do. It could be due to

reasons like the student feeling ashamed or that they think counseling wont really help. Image

two shows more examples of reasons for not receiving mental health services.

Image 2-Source: SAMSHA (2015). Reasons for Not Receiving Mental Health Services.

Retrieved from https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/NSDUH-DR-FRR3-

2014/NSDUH-DR-FRR3-2014/NSDUH-DR-FRR3-2014.htm
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After looking through the statistics the graph provides, it is noticed that one of the three

reasons a student did not get the help they need was because they were not sure where to go to

get it. A lot of the time, students are aware that there is some sort of counseling center on their

campus, but they are not aware of the actual services offered and what they do to go about

treating mental health problems.

In the hopes of finding out if the kind of training the counselors use is effective towards

treatment to mental health problems, we conducted primary research. The methodology used was

a compilation from The Special collections department to aid our research. Arlene King, the

author of this paper stated that the practicum and internship procedures have been the most used

because they are the most significant procedures that properly prepared a counselor to be

effective (1977). These trainings the counselors use give them the skills best needed to meet the

problems of students with mental health disorders. It can be found on UTEPs counseling

website that they have advanced practicum training and internship opportunities for counselors

which relates back to the evidence given by Arlene King that these are the best training

procedures counselors use while in session with the students.

Do anthropologists play any role in helping with a persons mental health?

Many professionals are available to help with mental health problems. The people that we

know treat patients the most, especially in universities, are counselors. The not so typical

professionals that help with mental health problems are anthropologists. According to Camenson

(2005), anthropologists learn many diverse skills and are able to understand why and how

humans do what they do (p. 8). These skills can actually help counselors understand why patients

have mental health problems and why they might not be receiving treatment. In one study by
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Kleinman (2006) , it was found out that when an anthropologist partnered up with a pediatrician

to try and understand why a Mexican father would not continue to take his son to get treatment

for a health problem he had, the pediatrician thought it was because the father did not know

much about his sons illness. The anthropologist actually found out that it was because he did not

have the means to travel to the doctors office nor the money needed for treatment (para. 3).

Conclusion/ Synthesis

In conclusion, this literary review has explored what mental health is like for university

students, whether or not they knew about the services offered for these problems, and what kind

of professionals can help. Mental health has always been a major problem especially among the

younger population and it was found out through some of these sources that many students were

dealing with mental issues under the radar. There were many reasons found why they did not

receive treatment, for example, they were ashamed or did not think counseling would help. It

was also found out though that the counseling center at The University of Texas at El Paso had

many programs to offer their students. By using primary research, it was found out that the

counselors were professionally trained with programs intended to treat specific problems of

mental health issues. Through the perspective of an anthropologist, they were able to work

closely with other professionals to come up with a better way of going about treating mental

health problems.
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References

Camenson, B. (2005). Great Jobs for Anthropology Majors. New York: McGraw-Hill

Professional.

Jibeen, T. (2016). Perceived social support and mental health problems among Pakistani

university students. Community Mental Health Journal, 52(8), 1004-1008.

doi:10.1007/s10597-015-9943-8

KING, ARLENE, "EFFECTIVENESS OF A SELF-CRITIQUING COUNSELOR TRAINING

MODEL ON DEMONSTRATED COUNSELING COMPETENCE." (1977). ETD

Collection for Fordham University. AAI7714870.

https://fordham.bepress.com/dissertations/AAI7714870

Kleinman A, Benson P (2006) Anthropology in the Clinic: The Problem of Cultural Competency

and How to Fix It. PLoS Med3 (10): e294. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.0030294

McGeown, S., Putwain, D., St. Clair-Thompson, H. and Clough, P. (2017), UNDERSTANDING

AND SUPPORTING ADOLESCENTS MENTAL TOUGHNESS IN AN EDUCATION

CONTEXT. Psychol. Schs., 54: 196209. doi: 10.1002/pits.21986

Ogden, T., & Hagen, K. A. (2014). Adolescent mental health : prevention and intervention.

Hove, East Sussex : Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group, 2014.

PBS News Hour (2015). More stress, less stigma drives college students to mental health

services. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSiMCluPFuY

Ponterotto, J. G., Casas, J. M., Suzuki, L. A., & Alexander, C. M. (Eds.). (2009). Handbook of

multicultural counseling. Sage publications. Retrieved from

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https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Wz8XBAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR11

&dq=handbook+of+multicultural+counseling+manuel+casas&ots=RyXtFTuyYr&sig=8S

OK5u8lH6ZY_k63dH51SPchPc4#v=onepage&q=handbook%20of%20multicultural%20

counseling%20manuel%20casas&f=false

SAMSHA (2015). Reasons for Not Receiving Mental Health Services. Retrieved from

https://www.samhsa.gov/data/sites/default/files/NSDUH-DR-FRR3-2014/NSDUH-DR-

FRR3-2014/NSDUH-DR-FRR3-2014.htm

Sneed, B (n.d.). Counseling and Psychological Services. Retrieved October 27, 2017, from

http://sa.utep.edu/counsel/aptp/

Tsao, E (2009). Why anthropologists should politicize mental illnesses. (2009.). Retrieved from

https://www.antropologi.info/blog/anthropology/2009/for-a-new-anthropology-of-

psychiatry

Uzman, E., & Telef, B. B. (2015). Prospective teachers mental health and their help-seeking

behaviours. Dnen Adam: Journal Of Psychiatry And Neurological Sciences, 28(3),

242-254. doi:10.5350/DAJPN2015280307

Wakeford, J. (2017, September 07). It's time for universities to put student mental health support

first | Jon Wakeford. Retrieved October 20, 2017, from

https://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/2017/sep/07/its-time-for-

universities-to-put-student-mental-health-first

Westermeyer, J. (Ed.). (1976). Anthropology and mental health: setting a new course.
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