Dark thoughts: why mental illness is on the rise in academia
University staff battling anxiety, poor work-life balance and isolation aren't finding the support they need
Claire Shaw and Lucy Ward
Photograph: Alamy
Mental health problems are on the rise among UK academics amid the pressures of greater job insecurity, constant demand for results and an increasingly marketised higher education system.
University
counselling staff and workplace health experts have seen a steady
increase in numbers seeking help for mental health problems over the
past decade, with research indicating nearly half of academics show symptoms of psychological distress.
"Culture of acceptance"
A recent blog on the Guardian Higher Education Network blog,
which highlighted a "culture of acceptance" in universities around
mental health issues, has received an unprecedented response, pointing
to high levels of distress among academics.
The article, which
reported instances of depression, sleep issues, eating disorders,
alcoholism, self-harming, and even suicide attempts among PhD
students, has been shared hundreds of thousands of times and elicited
comments outlining similar personal experiences from students and
academics.
But while anecdotal accounts multiply, mental health
issues in academia are little-researched and hard data is thin on the
ground.
However, a study published in 2013
by the University and College Union (UCU) used health and safety
executive measures, assessed against a large sample of over 14,000
university employees, to reveal growing stress levels among academics
prompted by heavy workloads, a long hours culture and conflicting
management demands. Academics experience higher stress than those in the
wider population, the survey revealed.
Tackling perfectionism
Pat
Hunt, head of Nottingham University's counselling service for staff and
students and a member of the UK body for heads of university
counselling services, said all universities were experiencing an
increase in mental health problems.
"There are increasing levels
of anxiety, both generalised and acute, levels of stress, of depression
and levels of what I would call perfectionism," she says.
"By that
I mean when someone is aiming for and constantly expecting really high
standards, so that even when there is a positive outcome they feel they
have fallen short. So instead of internal aspiration helping them to do
well it actually hinders them."
Academics are also caught up in a
range of cycles, from league tables and student satisfaction surveys to
research league tables, that dominate thinking, she adds. In one case, a
department's top position in a research profile "became a poisonous
thing because everyone then fights to maintain that".
Hunt said
higher education should not be stigmatised for the increase in mental
health issues, since it reflected a similar increase in wider society.
Figures show more working days are now lost to the mental health
problems than any other health issue.
Nottingham offers one-to-one
and group help to students and staff, including support specifically
targeted at men, who make up only a third of those seeking help, a
figure likely to reflect the continuing stigma over seeking help for
mental illness.
Increased workloads partly to blame
Dr
Alan Swann of Imperial College London, chair of the higher education
occupational physicians committee, blamed "demands for increased product
and productivity" for rising levels of mental health problems among
academics.
He says: "They all have to produce results – you are
only as good as your research rating or as good as your ability to bring
in funding for research."
Swann says most academics are stressed
rather than mentally unwell: "They are thinking about their work and the
consequences of not being as good as they should be; they're having
difficulty switching off and feeling guilty if they're not working seven
days a week."
Academics and researchers can become isolated and not realise how "out of kilter" their working lives are, he says.
The
intense pressure of doctoral and post-doctoral study, and early-career
academia can also reveal existing mental health problems, he adds.
Universities, including Imperial, have improved systems to help, yet
academia remains "pretty macho".
Uncaring academic environment
"There's
still a degree of 'if you can't stand the heat, you shouldn't be
here'," says Swann. He says there are "still people in senior positions
in academia who actually don't care".
He adds: "But there are
measures to counter that and there has been a lot of change for the
good. What we have not been able to get rid of are the external
pressures from government funding and the academic marketplace."
Research
by Gail Kinman, professor of occupational health psychology at the
University of Bedfordshire, on behalf of the UCU, offers one of the few
pieces of data on mental health problems among academics.
Kinman
used the health and safety executive's health and safety at work
framework to assess the views of some 20,000 academics, and found
"considerably higher" levels of psychological distress than in the
population as a whole.
She points to poor work-life balance as a
key factor, with academics putting in increasing hours as they attempt
to respond to high levels of internal and external scrutiny, a fast pace
of change and the notion of students as customers – leading to demands
such as 24-hour limit for responses to student queries.
Internalised values hard to shake
There
are examples of good practice within universities which could be shared
across the sector, Kinman says, but, as an independently-minded group
who are strongly committed to their work, academics are not always
straightforward to support. "We don't like being told 'you can't email
at two in the morning'. You can't impose solutions from other sectors –
academics are quite different and there's no 'one size fits all'."
And
internalised values are hard to shake. Nadine Muller, lecturer in
English literature and cultural history at Liverpool John Moores
University, suggests that academia promotes the blurring of lines
between the personal and the professional – often described as "doing
what you love".
"This means that doctoral and early-career
scholars are seldom trained in how to firmly draw that line and value
themselves beyond their work," says Muller.
UCU says issues
relating to mental health are frequently encountered by its
representatives. General secretary Sally Hunt says sufferers experience
particular prejudice at work. "Further and higher education workers who
experience issues relating to mental health face ignorance,
discrimination and stigma from their managers and colleagues.
"Negative
and inflexible attitudes can often exclude those with mental health
conditions from being able to do their job. Often these attitudes can
intimidate a person away from feeling able to disclose their mental
health condition at all."
John Hamilton, head of safety, health
and wellbeing at Leeds Metropolitan University, says academics' problems
are often a question of burnout, which he defines as a "significant
disengagement" with an employer, in which a staff member no longer feels
in charge of their role.
Some universities, including his own,
are working hard to offer support, he says, but while many could
"definitely do more", there remains a fundamental problem that some
academics simply do not like the changes in their sector that have taken
place over the last 20 years. "For some, it's going to be a case of
'I'm sorry, but this is the way it is, this is the political landscape'.
So there's an element of putting up with it."
If academics
already in post must wrestle with the stresses of fast change, what of
their successors? Edward Pinkney, a mental health consultant working in
education, says: "Institutions have a broader civic duty to educate
potential academics about the university environment, so that
prospective academics can make a more informed decision about whether or
not to proceed.
"As universities become increasingly
businesslike, there's a growing need for them to be independently
monitored to ensure that they are not just meeting basic standards of
support for their members, but also that they are providing an accurate
representation of academic life and not misselling it."
Mental health in academia: experiences from around the world
PhD in health sciences at a Canadian university
"At
the beginning of my PhD, the director of the department gave our entire
cohort a lecture about not getting pregnant and told one of my friends
when she applied for maternity leave that the PhD should be a time of
celibacy. Some of our supervisors publicly and proudly exchanged stories
of failed marriages as if this was the ultimate proof of their devotion
to research. Others gossiped about promising colleagues who 'would have
achieved so much more' had they not had children. All of these subtle
and not so subtle hints guaranteed that no graduate student, especially
those with families, would ever sacrifice enough for their research and
would thus, by implication, always be a failure in some respect."
Lecturer at the Open University, UK
"I
had only been working for the university for two years when I suffered a
severe breakdown and was hospitalised. It was very difficult indeed to
even contemplate going back to work but thanks to transition counselling
from the union I was able to resume work after nine months. The
transition counselling was invaluable for a number of reasons; it was
linked to work so helped me to begin to think about going back; it
carried on during my first few weeks back in the workplace, so it was
invaluable in dealing with my feelings at returning to that environment
again; and it enabled me to see my mental health problem as being no
different to any physical one. One of the hardest things to face after a
breakdown is facing the stigma (both real and perceived) that occurs in
the workplace. The union gave practical and psychological support,
without which I would not have been able to return work."
University of Maine School of Law, US
"During
my three years of law school, I had to come to grips with my acceptance
of and seeking treatment for depression and PTSD. I've been lucky to
have had a lot of support from close friends, but I've never shared
these issues with the faculty. The law school culture is effectively one
along the lines of 'suck it up'. When I worked in the law school
clinic, I actually hid and lied to my professor about the fact that I
was struggling with suicidal thoughts because I was afraid of simply
being booted out of a clinic I loved. While a very large amount of law
students I have known have coped with mental health issues and even
school-related nervous breakdowns, it's not talked about, or even
admitted beyond close friends."
PhD in chemistry, Bangor University, Wales
"In
2010 I started a PhD in chemistry. A year on, and the pressure began to
build, reaching the point where I had a nervous breakdown. I spent time
going to counselling for help, but then decided to take a 10-month
break from the research I was doing. Upon returning I was able to work
for a few months before falling back into depression because I felt I
had no chance of gaining the qualification I desired. I eventually got
to the stage where I felt I was going nowhere and cleared my desk late
one Saturday, saying nothing to anyone that I was leaving. While
suffering from depression, I felt isolated, as everyone around me was
able to get on with their PhDs. I felt I was the problem. I feel I
received some support for my issues but more could have been done to
ease me back into full-time study after returning."
PhD in molecular biology, Uppsala University, Sweden
"My
university and department supported me after I admitted I had been
diagnosed with depression. In the beginning I took advantage of
studenthälsan, the university's student health centre. Their team of
psychologists and psychiatrists helped me to find the right long-term
support. Later, my depression worsened and I was offered a private
psychologist at the cost of the department. Yes, my PhD studies are
still a demanding job full of stress, mentally as well as physically,
but I am glad that in the days where death was the only solution to
everything, my colleagues, supervisors and other officials became
friends that just wanted to help me."
The Guardian now wants to find out more about the problem.
This survey should take no more than a few minutes to complete, and in doing so you will contribute towards much-needed research into this area.
Thank you for your time. We will publish our findings on the Network soon.
Best wishes,
The Guardian Higher Education Network
Best wishes,
The Guardian Higher Education Network
