Editorial: The mental health of university students and young people

This issue of Mental Health and Social Inclusion contains the usual diverse range of papers, again demonstrating the global reach of the journal. There are five papers from the UK, two from India and one each from Canada, Jordan and Taiwan. Six of the papers look at the mental health of university students and young people and it is those that we start with.Yi-Chih Lee looks at the issue of mental health days for young people. Some 286 young people completed an online survey in Taiwan. This measured autonomy, competence, relatedness, motivation, subjective norms, perceived behavioural control and intention. Perhaps unsurprisingly, young people who have had counselling were more likely to endorse the use of mental health days. He concludes by stating that mental health days can be an effective way of managing mental health difficulties. Which is after all what they were designed for.Amrita Roy provides a very detailed analysis of all the policies, legislation and guidelines for students with mental health conditions in India. He documents several very positive developments in the last few years in India, such as guidelines to help socio-economically disadvantaged groups. There are also a wide range of scholarship schemes targeted at people with mental health problems.Sarah Callaghan and colleagues from the University of Waterloo in Canada address the issue of how university students are adapting to the post-Covid world in higher education. Based on an analysis of posts on Reddit, they identified six main themes. These covered the preferred modality of learning, rights and expectations, public health safety, political issues, mental health and wellbeing and the use of language. Interestingly there was a split in students’ views on returning to classroom-based teaching. Some students felt this boosted their mental health, yet for others this was found to be more stressful.Paul McGivern and Mark Mierzwinski look at the issue of gambling in university students. Statistics from the gambling industry report that some 47% of students have gambled in the last month, with 16% of these being seen as problem gamblers. Their own study comprised 128 non-gamblers and 82 gamblers. Only six students were found to be “high risk” gamblers. Men on sports-based programmes were found to be the group with the highest levels of gambling. This may be a group who are consequently also vulnerable to mental health issues.Razouneinuo Suokhrie and Imlisongla Longkumer conducted a study with young people from Nagaland in India. They looked at flourishing, languishing and locus of control in 196 young people. Interestingly higher flourishing levels were seen in the older group (26–35), in men, 42% versus 32% for women and in those who were employed, 42% versus 32% for the unemployed. Of the total sample, 36% were found to be flourishing versus 17% who were languishing. Participants with an internal locus of control were also more likely to be flourishing, 42% versus 17% for those with an external sense of control.Finally, in this short collection of papers on young people, Laith Hamdan Mansour, and colleagues from Jordan, examined self-esteem, academic stress, loneliness and personality dysfunction in 440 university students. Feelings of loneliness from family and friends were found to be the most important predictors of personality dysfunction.Of the remaining four papers in this issue, Rosalind Austin looks at published accounts of four American women’s experiences of mental illness. Readers of this journal will probably have heard of Elyn Saks. Elyn has given a powerful TED talk about her own battles with mental illness. The other authors are Pamela Wagner, Tracy Harris and Lori Schiller. Rosalind draws out some fascinating observations from these four accounts.Adam Benkwitz, Esther Ogundipe and Kirsty Spencer point to the importance of physical activity for improving both social inclusion and recovery. This is probably one of the most under-utilised approaches in the field of mental health care. Adam and colleagues provide a very helpful review of the important research being carried out in this area.Benjamin Gray, Matthew Sisto and Renee Conley talk about the split peer support workers face with staff perceptions of their role and how they are perceived by service users, a binary of “Us” and “Them”, or “One of us”, or “One of them”. They urge peer support workers to develop an approach so there is no “Us” and “Them”, but only “Us”.For the final paper in this issue, Robert Hurst interviews Victoria Claire for his Remarkable Lives series. Victoria is a highly talented sculptor with a difference. She is visually impaired, so she has never been able to see her amazing sculptures. Victoria shares the story of her “Blind a Sixth Sense” exhibition, which was set in a pitch-black gallery space and was visited by over 500 people. Robert interviews Victoria using the C-CHIME framework. While Victoria has produced some incredible works of art, she regards her greatest accomplishment as her journey to self-acceptance.Ten papers covering a wide range of mental health issues. We hope you enjoy reading them in depth.Professor Jerome Carson, Editor-in-Chief & Dr Julie Prescott, Co-Editor.

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