A recent study has just been published that found that one in two Ph.D. students show signs of psychological distress and one in three are at risk of developing a psychiatric disorder. This data is from a relatively small sample, less than 4000 students from a university in Belgium, however, these results aren’t shocking. In 2005, the University of California at Berkeley published a study in which they found that 10% of their graduate students had contemplated suicide. In 2015, they published another study where they found 47% of their Ph.D. students and 37% of their master’s students were considered depressed. A study published in 2008 found moderate to severe depression, anxiety and stress levels in 27.1%, 47.1%, and 27.1% of sampled university students, respectively. These aren’t even all of the studies. A simple Google search finds many different papers, blogs, news articles, etc. that talk about the mental health issues that students face in higher education.

Every year, multiple studies are published that report the same finding: students heavily suffer from mental illnesses due to life transitions, work load, stress, financial issues, etc. Some institutions, such as UC Berkeley started mindfulness and wellness programs for students, which included activities such as yoga and meditation. One study even showed that students with elevated symptoms of depressions displayed significant decreases in symptoms after five consecutive weeks of yoga. Most articles that report these statistics will list out ways to help decrease these occurrences, from encouraging advisors to seek out training to help recognize and help students in mental distress to institutions openly acknowledging problems and starting a conversation. However, despite all these studies and these methods of interventions, it does not seem like the occurrence and prevalence of mental illnesses among students is actually changing. Are there any follow up to these studies after they’re published? 10 years after UC Berkeley’s first report, not much had changed. So what do we do? How many more studies must be published before a change occurs? How do we even begin to make a change?