Impacts on College-Aged Asian American Mental Health

This study explores the relationship between different forms of racial harassment and mental health issues in Asian American college students. Asian American mental health is a growing concern in the field of public health. Asian Americans have the lowest treatment rates and some of the highest stigma levels of any demographic. They are also impacted by the model minority myth and discrimination, further alienating them from getting help. The topics of subtle racism, blatant racism, and current racial discrimination were compared to depressive symptoms, anxiety, self-esteem, and four domains of aggression using survey data. Subtle racism was found to be correlated with depressive symptoms, anger, and verbal aggression. Blatant racism was found to be correlated with depressive symptoms, anger, physical aggression, verbal aggression, and hostility. Current racial discrimination was found to be correlated with depressive symptoms, anxiety, anger, physical aggression, verbal aggression, and hostility. These findings have profound implications that both support previous work in Asian American mental health and pave the way for future studies in this field.