Student mental well-being was brought to the fore during the COVID-19 pandemic. Higher education is an important time for several reasons and psychology researchers have been focusing on how to provide support for student mental well-being and personal development.
Higher education: a key moment
Over and above the material and financial side, beginning higher education is a big step and requires the ability to adapt – quite often in a short period of time. Young people can find this hard and fall behind.
Even though the problem already existed, student poverty and isolation were brought to light during the pandemic.
Students are a vulnerable population who do not spontaneously seek healthcare help even though they are more likely to experience stress, anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts.
Accessible mental well-being support for students
Two studies were held during the health crisis to raise awareness about positive psychology benefits.
The first study was run by the CARE (Coherence Attention, Relation, Engagement) programme which corresponds to positive psychology interventions. The results show a considerable decrease in symptoms of stress, anxiety and depression, and increased optimism and motivation for studying, amongst the students who took the programme.
The second study was based on Etucare, a free digital platform, which provides cognitive and behavioural therapy and positive psychology. The results of this study are just as encouraging.
To go further:
- Shankland R. et al. (2018). Mettre en œuvre un programme de psychologie positive : le programme Care. Paris: Dunod
- Etucare: a digital programme to take care of your health as students. https://ireps-bfc.org/sites/ireps-bfc.org/files/files-upload/flyer-etucare-imp.pdf
Article updated on 21/11/22