Literature Review Blog #4

Cooke, Richard, Michael Barkham, Kerry Audin, Margaret Bradley, and John Davy. "Student Debt and Its Relation to Student Mental Health." Journal of Further and Higher Education 28.1 (2004): 53-66. Web.

Summary

This paper basically analyses the relationship between attitudes toward debt and the mental health of university graduates in the UK. The study showed that students became more concerned about their finances as they moved on through university and that their attitudes toward debt were related to their mental health levels. The study also found that students who had high financial concerns possessed significantly lower grades than students with low financial concerns. Students with high financial concerns felt more "tense, anxious, or nervous," more "criticized by other people," and found it more "difficult getting to sleep or staying asleep" than students with low financial concerns. They also found evidence to suggest that students with high worry about their debt anticipated leaving school with higher debt that low debt worry students. However, the study found no relation between anticipated debt and mental health. Basically what that means is, economic and demographic factors do not appear to predict mental health, but rather, a student's level of concern over finances shows the relationship. 

Authors

Richard Cooke, Michael Barkham, Kerry Audin, and Margaret Bradley- work in the Psychological Therapies Research Center in the School of Psychology at the University of Leeds

John Davy- works at the School of Computing at the University of Leeds

Key Terms

high financial concerns- shown to have a relationship with lower grades and more mental health problems

low financial concern- shown to have a relationship with better grades and less mental health issues

Quotes

"The increase in the cost of university appears to have impacted on students' debt tolerance. Work by Lea et al. (2001) indicates that students become more debt-tolerant as they progress through higher education. In contrast, the current data show that students become more concerned with finances as they progress through university... [the main] reason for the difference is the situation students in the present study, with most students having to take loans to pay for higher education, and these loans being much larger than in 1995. "(Cooke et al. pg 62-3)

"financial concerns are heightened as students complete their degrees" (Cooke et al. pg 63) 

"Examining the pattern of results for the comparisons between the high, low, and no debt worry groups suggests that the high worry group are not necessarily more worried about things in general." (Cooke et al. pg 64)

"The one difference between students with low and no debt worry was that students with low debt worry had less feeling that they had achieved things they wanted to compared to students with no debt worry. This interesting finding suggests that although the low debt worry students are not suffering worsened mental health due to their debt, they may be prevented from doing desired activities by their debt." (Cooke et al. pg 64)

Value

This is one of the most useful articles I have found. It is an in depth study on the actual factors that are related to my paper rather than just student debt and mental health. This article, along with the article mentioned by Lea et. al for comparison, will be crucial in delving deeper into the actual effects of student debt on mental health.

Literature Review Blog #3

Citation

Laidley, Thomas M. "The Privatization of College Housing: Poverty, Affordability, and the US Public University." Housing Policy Debate 24.4 (2014): 751-768.

Summary

This article details a study done on 20 major college towns and the relationship between students living off campus and poverty rates, as well as housing affordability. The study found that there is a strong positive association between off campus population and poverty rates, as well as a modest positive association between off campus population and housing affordability. This article states that due to the privatization of colleges, and the increased need for income, more people are enrolled, in order to keep up profits, but they don't always make sure they have enough accommodations for these students. This is causing an increase in off-campus housing, and the privatization of that market as well. 

Author

Thomas M. Laidley- graduated from Boston College and went to grad school at New York University, wrote about different sociological concerns involving housing, as well as various other sociological subjects

Key Terms

studentification- basically all of the social, environmental, and economic changes that happen when a town is flooded by students that attend college in that town

public universities- the privatization of which is causing an influx of students, showing a positive correlation to poverty as well as housing affordability

Quotes

"Even if students do not come from poor families, and even allowing for the potential for social mobility engendered by their college education (although there is ample evidence that this, too, is waning), many are still in economically precarious situations and are often living independently financially" (pg 756)

"While hypothetical scenarios where students bid up rents because they cannot obtain university housing may hurt local residents, this may also be a negative outcome for the students, who also are forced to pay more for shelter." (pg 763)

"With schools increasingly left on their own to operate as de facto businesses as funding disappears, institutional competition intensifies, and enrollments and housing needs steadily increase, not only are poverty rates likely to increase and affect the provisioning of ever-shrinking funding, but housing strategy also remains an open question" (pg 765)

Value

This article provides an insight on the effects of privatization of higher education that I have not thought about. I didn't think about the fact that due to the privatization of higher education. colleges want to obtain as many students as possible, and possibly neglecting the areas in which they are located. Students also may end up paying more for living arrangements because of this. This article shows another way that privatization of higher education is affecting students, as well as affecting the towns they reside in. 

Research Blog #5: Bibliography with at least Five Scholarly Sources

Works Cited

Becker, Dana. "Does "Stress" Hide Deeper Social Problems?" Time. Time Inc., 13 Mar. 2013. 

Web. 07 Mar. 2016.

Bennett, Doris, Cynthia McCarty, and Shawn Carter. "The Impact of Financial Stress on

Academic Performance in College Economics Courses.”Academy of Educational

Leadership Journal 19.3 (2015): 25-30. ProQuest. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Estroff Marano, Hara. "Crisis U." Psychology Today 48.5 (2015): 61-71 11p. CINAHL with Full

Text. Web. 6 Mar. 2016.

Laidley, Thomas M. "The Privatization of College Housing: Poverty, Affordability, and the US Public University." Housing Policy Debate 24.4 (2014): 751-768.

Lim, HanNa, et al. "Financial stress, self-efficacy, and financial help-seeking behavior of college students." Journal of Financial Counseling and Planning25.2 (2014): 148-160.

Meister, Bob. "Debt and Taxes: Can the Financial Industry Save Public Universities?" 

Representations. 1st ed. Vol. 116. N.p.: U of California, 2011. 128-55. The Humanities 

and the Crisis of The Public University.JSTORE. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Richardson, Thomas, Peter Elliot, and Ronald Roberts. "The Relationship between Personal Unsecured Debt and Mental and Physical Health: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis." The Relationship between Personal Unsecured Debt and Mental and Physical Health: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review, n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2016.

"Student Loan Statistics." - ACA International. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2016.

Walsemann, Katrina M., Gilbert C. Gee, and Danielle Gentile. "Sick Of Our Loans: Student Borrowing And The Mental Health Of Young Adults In The United States." Social Science & Medicine 124.(2015): 85-93. ScienceDirect. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Research Blog #4: Research Proposal

Aaron Triolo

Professor Goeller

Research in the Disciplines: College!

March, 2016

Research Proposal

Working Title: The Privatization of Stress

Topic

I intend to show, through the use of my sources, that the privatization of higher education is affecting the mental health as well as the future prospects of both students and post-students negatively. The main controversy that I will be discussing is privatization in general. The article written by Bob Meister, "Debt and Taxes: Can the Financial Industry Save Public Universities?” explains the controversies behind privatization, while explaining its effects on tuition and students. Besides that, I intend to provide evidence showing how the privatization of higher education is negatively affecting students.

Research Question

In what ways is the privatization of higher education damaging students?

Theoretical Frame

To start my paper, I will introduce the main topic, describing privatization stating my argument, that privatization of higher education is harming student and post-students in many ways, To begin my argument, I will rely on Meister’s article, as stated above. I want to explain how exactly the privatization of higher education is affecting tuition, as well as students.

I intend to then dive into how the raised tuition and need for student loans and the accompanying student debt is affecting students. I will discuss Walsemann, Gee, and Gentile’s article, "Sick Of Our Loans: Student Borrowing And The Mental Health Of Young Adults In The United States." This article details an analysis of the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (1997) in which they find evidence showing an association between student loans and poorer psychological functioning. This study brings up an important topic that needs to be discussed further in my paper: inequality. The study shows that parental wealth can moderate the association between student loans and poorer psychological functioning,

Along with the previously mentioned article, I plan on using Bennet, McCarthy, and Carter’s article, “The Impact of Financial Stress on Academic Performance in College Economics Courses.” This article describes a study done that shows a statistically significant link between financial stress and academic performance. This study also brings up the issues of inequality. As stated in the article,“A significantly higher proportion of the stressed students with lower scores were women, minorities, and first-generation college students, groups with below average rates of college attendance,” (Bennet, 29). Through discussing this along with the “Sick of Our Loans” article, three main negative effects of privatization are stated: student loans are affecting mental health negatively, worrying about student loans and scholarly financial struggles can negatively affect grades, and privatization is causing even more inequality amongst its students.

Dana Becker’s TIME article, "Does "Stress" Hide Deeper Social Problems?" discusses modern stress and its implications. She shows the transfer of stress from an institutional one, to a private one. Now, stress is “our” fault, rather than a larger societal problem that may be in place. Becker speaks of addressing these societal problems, rather than each taking them on as personal responsibilities. I am not sure yet whether Becker’s article will be best introduced along with the Meister article, in order to explain the progression of the paper, or closer to the end, to add a nice last input on the subject, and a good connection to a closing argument.

Hara Estroff Marano’s article, “Crisis U” is all about the general state of mental health amongst college students. This article may or may not find its way into my paper. If I end up using this article, it will be to show an example of how bad the problem of mental health in higher education is already, in order to strengthen the argument that some sort of societal change needs to happen.

Research Plan

One of my main concerns so far is that a lot of my research is bringing up inequality. Most of my research is saying that the main effect of privatization that has the most wide-spreading effects is the fact that it raises tuition, causing the need for student loans. This effect mostly affects low income students from low income families. I do not have much information on how privatization influence affluent students or even middle class students. Along with this, I need to find more ways that privatization directly affects students. A lot of what I have so far shows correlations, or links, but no conclusive evidence. This will involve more research on privatization itself, and its effects on higher education. I need to understand the full spread of how privatization is affecting higher education before I can understand its effects on the students

Working Bibliography

Becker, Dana. "Does "Stress" Hide Deeper Social Problems?" Time. Time Inc., 13 Mar. 2013.

Web. 07 Mar. 2016.

Bennett, Doris, Cynthia McCarty, and Shawn Carter. "The Impact of Financial Stress on

Academic Performance in College Economics Courses.”Academy of Educational

Leadership Journal 19.3 (2015): 25-30. ProQuest. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Estroff Marano, Hara. "Crisis U." Psychology Today 48.5 (2015): 61-71 11p. CINAHL with Full   Text. Web. 6 Mar. 2016.

Meister, Bob. "Debt and Taxes: Can the Financial Industry Save Public Universities?"

Representations. 1st ed. Vol. 116. N.p.: U of California, 2011. 128-55. The Humanities

and the Crisis of The Public University.JSTORE. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

"Student Loan Statistics." - ACA International. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2016.

Walsemann, Katrina M., Gilbert C. Gee, and Danielle Gentile. "Sick Of Our Loans: Student

Borrowing And The Mental Health Of Young Adults In The United States." Social Science & Medicine 124.(2015): 85-93. ScienceDirect. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Literature Review Blog #2

 Citation

Walsemann, Katrina M., Gilbert C. Gee, and Danielle Gentile. "Sick Of Our Loans: Student Borrowing And The Mental Health Of Young Adults In The United States." Social Science & Medicine 124.(2015): 85-93. ScienceDirect. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Summary

This article is about a group that analyzed data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1997) in order to see if there is an association between amount of student loans and psychological functioning in current students, as well as adults aged 25-31. The study found preliminary evidence showing that student loans are associated with poop psychological functioning in school as well as after.

Authors

Katrina M. Walsemann and Danielle Gentile work in the Department of Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior in the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina. Gilbert C. Gee works in the Department of Community Health Sciences in the Fielding School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina.

Key Terms

parental wealth- shown to moderate the effects of student loans on psychological functioning

psychological functioning- was assessed using a well known and reliable testing method of general mental health, was shown to have an association with the cumulative amount of student loans

Quotes

"This study provides preliminary evidence that student loans are associated with poorer psychological functioning while enrolled in school as well as in early adulthood, and further, that the cumulative amount of student loans borrowed may be moderated by parental wealth." (pg 92)

"Our results also indicate that the strength of the association between cumulative student loans and mental health is similar for individuals who do and do not attain a college degree." (pg 91)

"The present findings raise novel questions for further research regarding student loan debt and the possible spillover effects on ther life circumstances, such as occupational trajectories and health inequalities." (pg 85)

Value

This article will have much value to my paper. It clearly shows an association between student loans and poor mental health. This is a great piece of evidence for the point I am trying to make in my paper. It will go along well with the scholarly article I did my first Literary Review on. This article shows how student loans are affecting student psychologically, and the other article shows how educational financial stress is affecting schoolwork, I am starting to see a natural progression of how my paper read.

Literature Review Blog #1

Citation

Bennett, Doris, Cynthia McCarty, and Shawn Carter. "THE IMPACT OF FINANCIAL STRESS ON ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN COLLEGE ECONOMICS COURSES."Academy of Educational Leadership Journal 19.3 (2015): 25-30. ProQuest. Web. 7 Mar. 2016.

Summary

This article is about a study done on an Economics class, analyzing the effect of the students' stress about financial matters on their academic achievement. The study found a statistically significant link between financial stress and academic performance. 

Authors

Dr. Doris Bennet, Dr. Cynthia McCarty, and Shawn Carter are all Economics professors at Jacksonville State University

Key Terms

financial stress- found in 83% of the students questioned, showed a statistically significant link to academic performance

academic performance- found to be influenced by a number of factors: gender, parental education, GPA, ACT score, and financial stress, along with others

Quotes

"Students who were worried about paying for college averaged 4.5 percentage points lower in class grades than students who were not worried about paying for college." (pg 29)

"A significantly higher proportion of the stressed students with lower scores were women, minorities, and first-generation college students, groups with below average rates of college attendance. Working more hours to meet financial obligations, they have less time to study, which has a negative impact on their academic performance." (pg 29)

"Several studies found that financially stressed students were more likely to be employed and work longer hours, leaving less time for study. Financially stressed students were more likely to drop courses and less likely to graduate. (Welbeck et al, Kara et al, Trombitas)."(pg 26)

Value

This study will really help me to state the argument that through privatization raising tuition, and creating the need for student loans and the accompanying debt, students are affected negatively stress-wise, and therefor, affecting their academic performance.