Abstract
Stress that undergraduate students experience is a growing public health concern, and there is increasing attention to programs that promote protective factors and skills to support resilience and well-being. Be REAL (REsilient Attitudes and Living) is a program that has been shown to increase students' use of effective coping strategies, mindfulness, and sense of well-being. This study examined whether the program would be effective when delivered by university staff who mentor or advise students.Methods: Eleven university staff advising or mentoring students delivered Be REAL in a variety of campus settings to 271 students, and 116 students completed pre- and post-test assessments to evaluate potential changes in stress reduction, managing emotions, coping, social connections, well-being and mental health.Results: Students who participated in Be REAL showed significant pre to post-test improvements in perceived stress, emotion dysregulation, coping, social connection, self-compassion, and symptoms of anxiety. There was also a trend toward improvements in symptoms of depression.Conclusions: The findings suggest that training university staff who work with students to deliver well-being programs is a potential avenue for supporting college student mental health, and a more rigorous evaluation of the Be REAL program is warranted.
Highlights
IntroductionRecent years have revealed an upward trend in mental health concerns among college students and young adults
College Student Mental HealthRecent years have revealed an upward trend in mental health concerns among college students and young adults
We examined the number of classes the student participated in by the end of the program to determine whether participant characteristics were related to attendance
Summary
Recent years have revealed an upward trend in mental health concerns among college students and young adults. The American College Health Association [1] reports that approximately 40% of undergraduates have felt severely depressed in the last year, and more than 10% have seriously considered suicide [1]. Further study is needed to better understand this phenomenon and its causal factors, there appears to be sufficient evidence to conclude that reported mental health needs of college students are greater than years past and continuing to grow [3,4,5]. In 2020, the UW participated in the Healthy Minds Study, an annual survey that, among other things, measures rates of student mental health concerns. The results demonstrated that the mental health profile of UW students mirrors the national trends
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