Abstract:

Mental health issues were on the rise among American university students before the COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, suicide is the second leading cause of death among college students in the US. It is no surprise that Mental health issues have risen significantly during COVID-19 pandemic. Chirikov, Soria, Horgos, & Jones-White, (2020), surveyed 30,725 undergraduates and 15,346 graduate and professional students during May-July 2020 at nine public research universities. They found “35% of undergraduates and 32% of graduate and professional students” had “major depressive disorder,” and “39% of undergraduate and graduate and professional students” had generalized anxiety disorder.” Their survey results also indicated that the pandemic “led to increase in students’ mental health disorders compared to previous years.” They also found graduate and professional students having “major depressive disorder two times higher in 2020 compared to 2019, and the prevalence of generalized anxiety disorder is 1.5 times higher than in 2019.”

This author, a design educator, wanted to develop evidence-based stress and anxiety reduction strategies to assist her students. Through extensive literature reviews, she found that psychologists use Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction Strategies (MBSR) to assist patients having anxiety, stress, depression, and other psychological distress. Brown & Ryan, (2003), describe Mindfulness as a “state of consciousness in which there is an enhanced attention to moment-to-moment experience.” This practice of being in the moment and observe each thought and feeling without judgement, is based on Buddhist contemplative practices. Psychologists found that Mindfulness-based interventions help in reducing: social anxiety disorder (Goldin and Gross 2010), generalized anxiety disorder (Kabat-Zinn et al., 1992), depression (Kumar et al. 2008; Shapiro et al. 1998; Speca et al. 2000), depressive relapse (Ma and Teasdale 2004; Teasdale et al. 2000), anger (Speca et al. 2000), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (Zylowska et al. 2008), and para-suicidal behavior (Linehan et al. 1991).

Due to the extended period of COVID-19 pandemic, it is imperative to provide mental health tools to our students. Based on her research of Mindfulness, Positive Psychology, and Neuroscience, this author developed a new online course titled Happy you, Healthy You, to assist her design students. This course was offered during summer of 2020, and 2021, and the student feedback indicated that it was very beneficial in maintaining their well being. In this paper the author will share her research, teaching pedagogies, and the strategies she utilized to help her students in reducing stress and anxiety so that other instructors can adapt or develop similar strategies to assist their students in maintaining good mental health and well being. The author will also share some of the Mindfulness-based exercises and their outcomes, the challenges she and some of the students faced, and how they overcame these challenges. The author hopes that these strategies will help other educators in understanding the roadblocks and develop their own strategies to avoid it.

Keywords:

Mindfulness, Stress, Anxiety, Depression, Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Design Education, Mental Health, Positive Psychology, Neuroscience.