Mental Health Issues Among Malaysian Students: Finding Coping Methods

Mental health issues among students have become a pressing concern to be discussed in the essay. This issue prompting the need for greater awareness and support within educational institutions.Statistics indicate that 1% of total population of 28.3 million Malaysians people struggle with mental illness and 20% are facing mental health issues, Perhaps the most prominent mental health issues are depression, stress and anxiety. Meanwhile, survey of counseling center directors reported that 21 percent of counseling center students present with severe mental health concerns, while another 40 percent present with mild mental health concerns. This essay will discuss the mental health issues among University of Malaysia Sabah (UMS) students.

University students represent the investment of society for the future, so their mental health is an important factor not only for them, but also for society. There is a myth saying that character flaws induces mental health problems. People with mental health problems can survive from it if they try hard enough to overcome it but, the fact is mental health problems are not character related. Numerous causes contribute to problems with mental health that can result in detrimental effects including biological aspects, life experiences and family background. Dr Stephen Pereira, Director, The Insight Network, Consultant Psychiatrist expresses that Conditions of mental health are just as common in young people as in the general population, and some specific conditions are even more common among this age range. This survey also revealed the thoughts of self-harming to be relatively prevalent and this was almost twice as high as reported rates in 2017. This situation shows that the concern of mental health issues are of paramount importance. Mental health issues among university students speaks of an important and spiraling public health concern for which epidemiological data are essential.

Background Information on the Topic

It is necessary to analyze the source of this issue in order to interpret the whole situation . that led to mental health issues among students in UMS as well as to investigate it in both humane and practical.

Sometimes, mental health is viewed more as a matter of joke than of serious issue. People got a growing curiosity in the subject as it progresses. Mental health has an interesting historical background. Mental health issues were viewed as a religious matter, a form of religious punishment or possession of demons in early history in the literature of ancient Greek , Roman, Egyptian and Indian. Hippocrates was the first pioneer in the 5th century B.C. to tackle mental illness through medication or adjustments in a patient's environment. In this modern era, there are various types of advanced medications to recover from difficult situations and being able to bounce back from mental health problem as it is a major growing health concern.

University life can be an exciting yet daunting process through which they experience complicated emotions including uncertain, stressed, depressed and anxious. Being a university student, they often face various pressure and difficulties. Students are supposed to handle the amount of workload a university would anticipate. Some students find it as an arduous journey to complete it and feel stressed especially when it comes to their final year project. The stressed condition disturbs their educational and career goals. Another cause is fear of future among final year students. Students are aware of the job market is growing ever more dynamic, resulting in increased competition among university students. Fresh graduates finding employment are being pushed to deal with intensified demand. Employers have improved labor market competition as they are competing for high and STEM skills possessing employees. From this situation, students form a hint of potential way to mental health issues such as anxiety.

Mental Health Act was implemented in many countries across the globe including Malaysia for legislation relating to mental health law. The turning point for the provision of mental healthcare in Malaysia was the introduction of the Mental Health Act in 2001. The Malaysian Mental Health Act 2001 did not come into operation until the 2010 Mental Health Regulations took effect. The Act offers a mechanism for ensuring adequate diagnosis, treatment, control, protection and rehabilitation for mentally disordered individuals.

Possible Ways in Coping Mental Health Issues Among Students

Tackling mental health issues will not be easy, but there are measures that can be taken. Apart from depending on health agencies to track mental health and wellbeing problems within students, universities need to expand social resources or by providing effective counseling service to help them cope with mental health concerns and can look after their own students.

The demand for counseling services on universities in United Kingdom has increased dramatically by 33% since 2008. This proofs that counseling service is an effective way to face mental health issues. Counselling service in universities can be improvised by making the service accessible for students easily without long procedures. The barriers of seeking help or counseling can be reduced if the past physiological help has been successful. Adolescent who had received counseling service previously have more encouraging hope in seeking counseling service in. For example, if a student’s previous counseling session was helpful for him or her, the chances of seeking help for the second time is high. Counseling service can be carried out in psychotherapeutic way if the issue is severe. This includes altering the individual's personality or reasoning mechanism to eliminate negative thoughts. This can be achieved in two ways which are cognitive behavioural counseling (CBT) and interpersonal communication (IPT) whereby CBT can help people change their thought process While for more serious cases, IPT is used including conflicting relationships and other serious personal issues.

The Help of Professional Counselors and Counseling Service

Providing counseling service is an effective way to be implemented. If students are able to try and receive support from psychologist, distressing psychological effects can be reduced. In counseling session, students can view their thoughts and opinions from different perspective whereby expressing their thoughts and emotions via verbal let them to see them from a new perspective, instead of just in the interior of their own mind. Other than that, letting things that have been kept inside out can be a relief as many people find that they are relieved of the thoughts or feelings they have bottled up in their minds. Having a relief also feels like a weight off the mind and helps people to start letting go of the negative emotions that they previously kept on to. One of the strategic effort to improve the quality of counseling services in university is to analyze the satisfaction of the students (as service users) for the services they receive. The understanding the client's voice is a significant for continuous improvement of the quality to attain total customer satisfaction.

However this solution has it’s weakness as one in four people who need help did not seek services due to the concerns about what others might think.

During counseling meeting, students need to share all their information in a structured place and time. In fact, this makes students afraid towards counseling services from professional counselors.

Conclusion

It was found that past experiences, awareness and intention to use has a significant relationship with their intention to utilize counseling services within their universities. The time has come for us to reform the old paradigm on mental health issues and acknowledge that handling mentally ill patients adequately is as vital as handling those who are physically ill. 

References

1. Ibrahim, A. K., Kelly, S. J., Adams, C. E., & Glazebrook, C. (2013). A systematic review of studies of depression prevalence in university students. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 47(3), 391-400.

2. Eisenberg, D., Hunt, J., & Speer, N. (2013). Mental health in American colleges and universities: Variation across student subgroups and across campuses. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 201(1), 60-67.

3. Stallman, H. M. (2010). Psychological distress in university students: A comparison with general population data. Australian Psychologist, 45(4), 249-257.

4. Rotenstein, L. S., Ramos, M. A., Torre, M., Segal, J. B., Peluso, M. J., Guille, C., & Mata, D. A. (2016). Prevalence of depression, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation among medical students: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA, 316(21), 2214-2236.

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5. Hunt, J., & Eisenberg, D. (2010). Mental health problems and help-seeking behavior among college students. Journal of Adolescent Health, 46(1), 3-10.