How to Combat Anxiety Disorders: Cases of College Students in Taiwan
Nowadays, anxiety disorders have turned into a common reason explaining the increasing number of college students going to seek help from consultants. Anxiety disorders is a kind of mental disorders that has the emotional reactions such as being uneasy, uncertain and fear to future events. These mental states often further cause the physical symptoms such as shakiness, sweat and increased heartbeat. There is no any specific group that is more vulnerable to this mental problem; however, more and more health-related reports have shown that college students, regardless of their nationalities, are gradually becoming the massive majority that suffered from this problem. According to American College Health Association (2015), near one-sixth students have been diagnosed with anxiety disorders or been under medical treatment out of anxiety disorders in the last twelve months. Not only in America, students in Hong Kong are also affected. As Lun et al. (2018) found in the research, which has participants of 1200 undergraduate students from eight different universities in Hong Kong, 54.4% respondents have mild to severe anxiety symptoms. Based on research conducted in different regions, we know that anxiety disorders of college students are universal issues which are worth being taken care of. In this paper, I will examine the reasons behind the psychological crisis faced by Taiwanese students, assess the support mechanisms provided by universities, and try to give some suggestions based on the observation.
To examine the phycological issue faced by Taiwanese students, I conducted a survey with college students. The survey was filled out by a total of seventy college students, which include 22 males and 48 females from 23 universities in Taiwan. Almost all respondents (98.7%) feel anxious in their daily lives to some degree: seldom (14.5%), sometimes (35.5%), usually (40.8%) and always (7.9%) (Figure 1). This result seems to confirm with the assertion of the counselor, Dan Jones, from the Appalachian State University who indicated that anxiety has become a typical badge of modern college students. When being asked about the reason triggering their anxiety, respondents’ top two reasons are respectively, expectedly, schoolwork and out-of-school work or internship (Figure 2). Moreover, from the survey I conducted, many point out that uncertainty or pessimism towards future plays a greatly pivotal role in causing their mental unease. I also notice that the sex and the year of study might not play a role in affecting their anxiety.
Figure. 1. Percentage of students feeling anxious in daily lives
(1=never, 2=seldom, 3=sometimes, 4=usually, 5=always)
Figure. 2. Percentage of reasons triggering anxiety to Taiwanese college students
Although all respondents have the autonomy to establish some kinds of approaches dealing with the inner problem, the environment still should prevent our college students from setting foot in front of the door of the dreary mood. Based on the result, we can identify two shortages: 1) the support provided by the outer environment, and 2) the education of mental health strengthening the students, which cause the common phenomenon among college students. It is undoubtedly justified to say that we should reinforce these shortages.
First, the support of the outer environment can further be divided into assistance from in-the-school related sections and erasing the unrealistic expectations projected by the whole society. As for in-the-school related sections, it seems that the universities do not make themselves trustful or familiar enough to students to consult with or do not provide enough channels that are accessible at any time for demand. According to my survey, only two respondents say that they sometimes seek help from related sections in universities and, sadly, 82% of the respondents never consult in-the-school counseling systems. They are even more willing to spend money on help from out-of-school clinics or hospitals. Also, nearly 60% of the respondents always or usually choose doing leisure activities, such as sports or watching movies, as their approach to eliminate the anxious feeling. The result shows that many rely on themselves rather than on outer resources to cope with the mental uneasiness (Figure 3). Interestingly, 73.7% respondents claimed that the universities do provide enough support for them (Figure 4). To narrow the gap between school resources and students, related sections can do more advertisements to promote themselves while revising the counseling system and training counselors to be able to speak English for the need of foreign students. When being asked about the suggestions they would give to the schools in the aspect of serving support, many of the respondents think time limitation is a problem. For example, people need to reserve the counseling system, and the waiting time may last one day or even more than a week. Also, students cannot get the school help in weekends. Therefore, the counseling system fails to provide immediate help at every moment. Some also notice the inequality between local students and foreign students in respect of having chances to seek help; thus, universities should also pay attention to that aspect. Though the process may cost a lot and the complex job involves many time and people, it is totally worthwhile because it can improve the quality of mentality in Taiwan’s learning environment.
Figure. 3. Percentage of cope mechanism people use to cope with anxiety
Figure. 4.
Second, outer environment may post stressful expectation to students. Therefore, parents may have to change their parenting method while high schools may provide more counseling to guide confused students to the life path they sincerely love in order to solve anxiety problem radically. Replying in my survey, many Taiwanese college students are worried about their career planning. What’s worse, the expectations pressed on by parents or other authority figures and the lack of guidance may add fuel to the fire. As stated in Liao’s research (2015), in Asian culture, the opinions from parents often influence the major choice of the children. Once the choice is not in agreement with the real interest of the children, children will probably have lower commitment to the study, which may cause their uncertainty and fear towards the future career. In another study, Agliata (2009) found that parent-college student expectation discrepancies and the college students’ mental illness such as depression and anxiety are significantly interrelated. For the part of parental method, it is probably a long, difficult and gradual process of change because it is related to the whole cultural ethos. However, we can try to adjust our ideas through education; it is not impossible to change and to further increase the mentality of the whole body of citizens. As for the part of in-the-school counseling system, our curriculum should give more time for related classes from elementary schools rather than focusing only on academic achievement. After all, if students do not know how to turn their passion in academia into career development, it is no use of scores on the grade sheets.
Last but not lease, the education of mental health is important in solving the anxiety disorders. Anxious college students may hide their feelings rather than reaching hands out for help because stigma-related shame and stress may deter them from seeking help. As Schibalski et al. (2017) indicated, “Increased stigma stress was predicted by ……higher levels of perceived stigma, group identification and perceived legitimacy of discrimination” (pp. 224-230). However, by hiding emotions, the possibility of being trapped in the emotional loop is increased. In order to encourage students not to be ashamed of proactively seeking help, teaching the accurate attitudes towards mental health is needed for students at any age. Reflecting upon education that Taiwanese students receive from elementary schools to universities, we know that there is barely any class teaching us how to cope with mental unease. Everyone has had the experience of encountering frustration in life, and it is effective and positive to ask professional advice, helping dragging the person out of the emotional abyss. We should not put any stigma on others and, of course, ourselves. With more and more people being willing to ask assistance, bravely face problems in life, the quality of mentality will definitely be improved.
To sum up, the problem of anxiety disorders among Taiwanese college students is obvious, by investigating this issue, we can divide the core problem into three parts: the gap between students and school counseling resources, the uncertainty to career planning and the stigma-related stress to seek advice. By analyzing these problems and providing some feasible solutions such as revising school counseling system and emphasizing related education, I hope this paper could contribute some implications for schools in Taiwan for assisting the real mental needs of college students.
References
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