Canadian Post-secondary Students' Experiences of Continuing Stress and Psychological Distress After the COVID-19 Pandemic: a Cross-Sectional Trend Analysis

Canadian post-secondary students are experiencing increased mental health-related concerns, including stress, psychological distress, and symptoms of mental illnesses. This high-risk population is subject to many stressors due to the post-secondary setting, ongoing brain development, and increased stressors with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The rates of symptoms of anxiety and depression among post-secondary are higher compared to the general population and continue rise throughout the pandemic. Previous research has revealed the need for further studies concerning mental health and stress in this population. The majority of existing studies were conducted early on in the pandemic, therefore the proposed study will focus on the mental health of post-secondary students starting in 2024, allowing for the assessment of the residual effects of COVID-19. The primary objective will be to describe trends in post-secondary stress and mental health at this time in a Canada-wide sample. This will be a cross-sectional study with data collected at multiple time points. A trend analysis will thus be employed to compare results for each of the variables. Measures will include validated mental health questionnaires such as the psychological distress scale (K-10), the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) and the perceived stress scale (PSS-10). Respondents will also be asked a variety of demographic questions (i.e., sex, school, student status). Analyses will be conducted to determine whether prevalence estimates of each of the measures changed over time. The proposed study will contribute to the expanding body of literature on the subject of post-secondary mental health, and fill gaps left by previous research.