Anxiety and depression are the most commonly reported mental health problems at Dartmouth, according to the the Dartmouth Health Survey, published by the Office of Institutional Research earlier this week. While alcohol use was higher than national averages, drug usage at the College was lower than national reports.
This year, 73 percent of Dartmouth students sampled said they had consumed alcohol within the past 30 days, compared to 63 percent of the national figure. High-risk drinking at Dartmouth rose 12 percent from 2012 levels. Defined as five or more drinks consumed in one sitting, high-risk drinking at Dartmouth continues to be higher than the national sample.
Since 2012, reported treatment for anxiety has increased at Dartmouth to 11 percent from 2012’s 9 percent. Reported treatment for panic attacks has increased to 5 percent from 2012’s 1 percent. Reported treatment for other mental health disorders, such as eating disorders and depression, has remained at approximately the same percentage over the past four years.
Stress is reported as the factor that most affects students’ academic performance, followed by sleep difficulties and anxiety. Satisfaction related to academic life, community, social life and residential life has essentially remained constant over the past four years, though satisfaction with academic life has slightly increased and satisfaction in the later three categories has slightly decreased.
Dartmouth students’ sample use of marijuana, cigarettes and tobacco are all less than the national college average, however. To prevent pregnancy, 36 percent of students reported that themselves or their partner use birth control pills, 47 percent report using condoms and 3 percent use an IUD. Since 2008, the percentage of sampled students that use condoms has increased from 42 percent, while the percentage that use birth control pills has increased by a single percentage point. The report showed decreases in reported rates of sexual touching without consent as well as attempted and actual sexual penetration without consent. While reports of sexual touching without consent fell to 9 percent from 14 percent, this figure is higher than 2013’s national average of 6 percent, the most recent data available.
In conducting this year’s survey, the Office of Institutional Research used a different data collection method than in past years.
Previously, data had been collected from a random sample of half of the undergraduate population who were asked to participate in the survey. The other half of the population had been invited to answer a separate survey on patient satisfaction.
This year, all students were asked to answer the first seven questions of the survey, which pertained to general health, safety, alcohol use and relationship violence. About 1,600 students were then randomly selected to participate in the remainder of the survey, while others were routed to the patient satisfaction survey.
The health survey has seen response rates varying from 19 percent to 38 percent. These numbers did not vary by much under the new data collection system, with 38 percent of the 4,068 undergraduates surveyed responding to the first section of the survey.
“One issue on our campus and other campuses is over-surveying students,” health services codirector Jack Turco said. “If you have a new survey and want to get a reasonable response, you realize that if you send all surveys to all people, some people are going to say ‘I’m sick of doing these.’”
Developed to mirror national surveys such as those collected by the American College Health Association and the National Collegiate Health Assessment, the Dartmouth Health Survey is also intended to track trends specific to Dartmouth and areas of interest to the Dean of the College Division, Turco said.
“We, like many other schools, conduct surveys like this to get an idea of what the current practices are, what the current issues are, and to look from year to year to see if there are any changes,” he said. “For example, if we notice that a lot more students smoke cigarettes than five years before, then we get together to talk about initiatives we want to do and prioritize it more than if there was an extremely low amount of smoking.”
While the survey did provide demographic information for the students that responded, it did not provide a demographic breakdown of the undergraduate population as a whole. This means that results may need to be carefully analyzed, Niloofar Bavarian, a postdoctoral fellow who has researched binge drinking and prescription drug use at the University of California at Berkeley School of Public Health said.
“You can’t just say ‘Okay 6 percent of Dartmouth students misused prescription stimulants,’” Bavarian said. “You can only say 6 percent of the study sample misused prescription stimulants.”
Keeping survey demographics in mind, getting accurate data from students is a more general problem, Bavarian said.
“Even if they are secured that certain protocols are in place to secure identity, there is still the fear that it could get traced back,” Bavarian said. “You want to ask the question in a way that doesn’t seem judgmental in nature.”
Surveys continue to be a critical part of campus life and national life as a whole despite this problem, Oregon State University College of Public Health and Human Sciences professor Brian Flay said. As long as their size is large enough, Flay said, surveys can provide accurate data that colleges and universities can use to make changes in health-related policies.
