Student Stress Levels
In 2012 and 2014, random samples of McGill University undergraduate and graduate students participated in a survey to measure students’ psychological wellbeing at McGill as part of the Counselling and Mental Health Benchmark Study (DiGenova & Romano, 2014). The were many components to the survey such as: demographic questions, 62 items from an instrument known as the Counselling Centre Assessment of Psychological Symptoms (CCAPS-62), along with measures of suicidality, trauma, financial distress, rates of accessing care, and social support. Moreover, DiGenova & Romano state that an important facet of the CCAPS-62 is that it was designed to capture the eight subscales representing some of the most common psychological symptoms (not clinical diagnoses) reported by post-secondary students. One of the subscales measured by the CCAPS-62 was the construct of academic distress. Academic distress was assessed based how respondents rated themselves on a five-point scale (from 0 to 4) for a series of statements ostensibly related to the construct in question.
Framing academic distress as a symptom of psychological distress is interesting because of how it was measured. For instance, two of the five items used to judge academic distress by the CCAPS-62 were statements such as “I am not able to concentrate as well as usual”, and “I am unable to keep up with my schoolwork”. Such statements are of note because it is uncertain as to whether the items used by the CCAPS-62 are the best indices of academic distress, or whether they are perhaps measures of different constructs altogether. Regardless, the majority of survey respondents identified academic distress as a prominent concern for students (DiGenova & Romano, 2014).
The prominence of the effect of academic distress on students’ psychological wellbeing stands out in my mind because, as a student at McGill, I can relate to experiencing significant levels of stress stemming from academics. Moreover, this seems to be a fairly common experience not only among other McGill students, but also among students in general. According to the 2013 National College Health Assessment conducted at McGill University, the majority of McGill students reported experiencing greater than average levels of stress and/or feeling overwhelmed by everything they had to do within the last twelve months (Tellier & DiGenova, 2014). These findings are also consistent with the Canadian average at other universities (Tellier & DiGenova, 2014).
Taken together, the cited examples serve to both normalize and perpetuate the idea that being a student necessitates experiencing high levels of stress in order to perform at a high academic level within a university context. However, an important element I think is missing from discussions pertaining to the impact high levels of academic stress have on student psychological wellbeing, is the role that institutions of higher learning play in fostering environments that promote cultures in which high stress becomes the standard instead of the exception. There is effort on campuses to equip students with different skills and strategies to help manage stress; however, very little effort it seems is dedicated to changing the systems that appear to be at the crux of the issue. In other words, university campuses tend emphasize people adapting themselves to their environment(s), instead of working to also change institutional frameworks to be able to adapt to the people within them.
It is important to help students develop abilities to regulate stress in their lives, and whatever programming that exists on campuses for those purposes should continue to do so. However, it is worth remembering that the relationship between students and universities is not a one-way transaction. There should also be resources dedicated to changing the environment(s) to adapt to the people within them instead of it exclusively being the other way around. For example, the ways in which curricula are structured can engender significant amounts stress.
I would venture a hypothesis that academic distress is highly correlated with, if not causally related to, students’ conceptions of success and failure. Within universities, a reasonable argument can be made that student perceptions of success and failure are likely intimately tied to their grades. The potential link between grades and success/failure is important with regards to how courses are structured. Courses are often structured in ways that penalize students for the mistakes they make through the presence of static grades. What this means is that once a student has reached a particular milestone within a course (i.e. midterm, assignment, etc.), and they receive a grade for their work, the grade is believed to reflect their understanding and mastery of the content that has been covered. This manner of thinking facilitates a point of view of grades being a fixed and unchanging representation of a student’s learning. As a result, it neglects the reality that learning can take place long after an assignment or exam has passed. Furthermore, there often no opportunities for students to be able to demonstrate their continued learning, and also to have their efforts in this reflected in their grades.
Given the available data, I wonder what proactive measures McGill and other universities are doing to address the number of students saying that academic distress is a concern for them? I think it would be worthwhile for university staff and faculty to explore ways of changing cultures within universities so that high levels academic stress is no longer considered to be the norm. One potential way to start a culture shift would be to find ways to have curricula structured so that students are encouraged to learn from their mistakes, instead of feeling like they’re indefinitely penalized for having made them. In doing so, I would suspect there would also be a decrease in levels of academic distress.
Works Cited:
DiGenova, L., & Romano, V. (2014). Student psychological wellbeing at McGill University: A report of findings from the 2012 and 2014 Counselling and Mental Health Benchmark Study.
Tellier, P., & DiGenova, L. (2014). Student health at McGill University: A report from the findings of the 2013 National College Health Assessment.
