Mental Health of College Students and Their Non-college-attending Peers: Results from the National Epidemiologic Study on Alcohol and Related Conditions

By Carlos Blanco, Mayumi Okuda, C. Wright, D. Hasin, B. Grant, Shang-min Liu, Mark Olfson. Archives of General Psychiatry, 2008

1,543 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Context Although young adulthood is often characterized by rapid intellectual and social development, college-age individuals are also commonly exposed to circumstances that place them at risk for psychiatric disorders. Objective To assess 12-month prevalence of psychiatric disorders, sociodemographic correlates, and rates of treatment among individuals attending college and their non-college attending peers in the United States. Design, Setting, Participants Face-to-face interviews were conducted in the 2001-2002 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions ([NESARC] n=43,093). Analyses were done for the subsample of college-age individuals, defined as those aged 19-25 that were both attending (n=2,188) and not attending college (n=2,904) in the previous year. Main Outcome Measure Sociodemographic correlates and prevalence of 12-month DSM-IV psychiatric disorders, substance use, and treatment seeking among college-attending individuals and their non-college attending peers. Results Almost half of college-age individuals had a psychiatric disorder in the past year. The overall rate of psychiatric disorders was not different between college-attending individuals and their non-college attending peers. The unadjusted risk of alcohol use disorders was significantly greater for college students than their non-college attending peers (OR: 1.25, 95%, CI:1.04-1.50), though not after adjusting for background socio-demographic characteristics (AOR: 1.19, 95%: 0.98-1.44). College students were significantly less likely (unadjusted and adjusted) to have a diagnosis of drug use disorder or nicotine dependence or have used tobacco than their non-college-attending peers. Bipolar disorder was less common in individuals attending college. College students were significantly less likely to receive past year treatment for alcohol/drug use disorders than their non-college-attending peers. Conclusions Psychiatric disorders, particularly alcohol use disorders, are common in the college-age population. Although treatment rates varied across disorders, overall, less than 25% of individuals with a mental disorder sought treatment in the year prior to the survey. These findings underscore the importance of treatment and prevention interventions among college-age individuals.

Subfields: Education, Epidemiology, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/236cd0019521a3857c3662de1dd6f77b71be8f79

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Citations in the corpus

Stigma and Help Seeking for Mental Health Among College Students (2009, background): “First, although college students have a similar overall prevalence of mental disorders as same-aged noncollege students, the prevalence of severe mental illness such as bipolar disorder is lower (Blanco et al., 2008).”
Changes in undergraduate students’ psychological well‐being as they progress through university (2010, background): “While, within North America, data sets have facilitated an epidemiological approach to investigating student mental health (e.g. Blanco et al. 2008), such information is not currently available within the UK.”
Mental Health and Academic Success in College (2009, background): “Given the high prevalence of both depression and anxiety disorders among college students (Blanco et al., 2008), improving knowledge about their co-occurrence and how this affects academic outcomes would be valuable.”
Faculty Attitudes and Knowledge Regarding College Students with Disabilities. (2015, background): “Or, do they instead think of substance abuse, personality disorders, depression, and anxiety disorders, the four most commonly diagnosed mental health disorders in college students (Blanco et al., 2008)?”
Health Care Experiences of Transgender Binary and Nonbinary University Students (2019, background): “First, we did not specify a time frame (e.g., past year) in inquiring about mental health diagnoses; thus, rates of diagnosed mental health disorders are not directly comparable to the work of Bianco et al. (2008) and other researchers that ask about pastyear diagnoses.”
Work organization and mental health problems in PhD students (2017, background): “data demonstrating the steadily increasing rates of college students aged between 18 and 24 with diagnosable mental health problems, and there is evidence that students already begin their university careers with mood, anxiety and eating disorders (Blanco et al., 2008).”
MENTAL HEALTH PROBLEMS IN COLLEGE FRESHMEN: PREVALENCE AND ACADEMIC FUNCTIONING (2017, background): “Differences between college students and their non-college peers are generally understudied but the available evidence shows that college students are somewhat at lower risk of mental disorders (Auerbach et al., 2016; Blanco et al., 2008).”
Competition, Anxiety, and Depression in the College Classroom: Variations by Student Identity and Field of Study (2016, background): “1 (somewhat agree and categories with lower levels of agreement), 0 (strongly agree) Weak social support is associated with student depression and anxiety (Blanco et al., 2008) Gender What gender are you?”
Mental Illness Stigma as a Mediator of Differences in Caucasian and South Asian College Students' Attitudes toward Psychological Counseling. (2010, background): “The National Epidemiologic Study on Alcohol and Related Conditions (Blanco et al., 2008) found that approximately 50% of the college population met diagnostic criteria for a psychiatric disorder in the preceding 12 months, with less than 25% of these persons receiving any mental health treatment.”
Student fears of oral presentations and public speaking in higher education: a qualitative survey (2021, background): “Prevalence estimates for SAD in university students have been identified in the literature by Kählke et al. (2019), ranging from 3.4% (12 months) in the United States (US) (Blanco et al. 2008) to 16.1% (point prevalence) in Sweden (Tillfors and Furmark 2007).”
How universities can enhance student mental wellbeing: the student perspective (2019, background): “…UK show that not only is the demand for these services increasing, but more students are presenting with increasingly severe psychological problems (Blanco et al., 2008; Erdur-Baker, Aberson, Barrow, & Draper, 2006; Locke, Bieschke, Castonguay, & Hayes, 2012; Royal College of Psychiatrists, 2011).”
The prevalence and correlates of depression, anxiety, and stress in a sample of college students. (2015, background): “While stress is an inevitable part of life, it is very present (Blanco et al., 2008) and becoming more prevalent among university students (Gallagher, 2008; Mackenzie et al.”