The number of UK undergraduate students reporting mental health conditions has tripled in seven years, with hopes that things were improving among certain badly affected groups proving to be a false dawn.
An estimated 300,000 students could now be experiencing mental health struggles in the UK, according to Transforming Access to Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO) and the Policy Institute at King’s College London, whose highlights that?almost one-fifth (18 per cent) of students reported a mental health?issue in 2024.
This is triple what it was in 2017, when about 6 per cent of students reported mental health challenges. Rates are now at their highest levels since?records began, and?the report says that “while the Covid-19 pandemic is often considered to have contributed to this, it does not explain the ongoing rise in mental health difficulties”.
It adds that “even allowing for changing definitions and an increasing openness about mental health”, the findings suggest that “many thousands of students are experiencing substantial distress and that this number has risen dramatically in recent years”.
“The trend pre-dates the Covid-19 pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis. Although these factors play a part in students’ deteriorating mental health, they cannot therefore be the only explanation.”
The report, which draws on data collected for the latest Student Academic Experience Survey?that polled 93,212 students, found there were significant disparities between demographic groups, with women being twice as likely to report mental health difficulties (22 per cent) compared with men (11 per cent).
Overall, students who identify as LGBTQ experienced by far the highest rates of mental health challenges. This has dashed hopes that mental health among LGBTQ students might be improving – which was “one of the few positive stories” to come out of the previous report, when it was identified that?mental health rates among these students had declined.
Some 42 per cent of bisexual and lesbian students said they faced mental health challenges, compared with 35 per cent of bisexual students who said they did last year, and 32 per cent of lesbian students.
Mental health difficulties among lesbian?women and gay men rose at approximately three times the rate of straight people, and among bisexual and asexual people at roughly?twice the rate.
Meanwhile, the number of trans students who reported mental health conditions jumped from 25 per cent in 2023 to 40 per cent in 2024.?
Michael Sanders, TASO’s academic lead and professor of public policy at King’s College London, said LGBTQ students and women “bear the brunt of this rise” in declining mental health, and “urgent action is needed to understand and address these trends”.
Omar Khan,?chief executive at TASO, added that the findings showed “we need a comprehensive response from the sector and wider society, involving a ‘public health approach’ to student mental health, and to mental health generally”.?
He added that services – whether well-being or clinical – “need to be clearly signposted to students, and available for those who are most at risk of mental health difficulties – especially LGTBQ+ students, women, and those from state schools”.?
