Josh Imhof | staff writer

Prior to and certainly during the pandemic, mental health awareness in the United States has become a popular topic on social media campaigns, in universities and at workplaces.

Because of these efforts, the number of people receiving mental health services is on the rise, with an almost 40% increase between 2019-2022.

However, despite its good intentions, the recent mental health awareness push has had adverse and even harmful effects on society.

Lucy Folkes and Jack Andrews, both researchers at Oxford University, evaluated this phenomenon in an article for the New Ideas in Psychology journal.

They theorized that more awareness surrounding mental health disorders has led to more people who don’t have disorders reporting possible symptoms of them.

They described this as the “Prevalence Inflation Hypothesis.”

In this case, these possible symptoms are normal emotions and feelings of everyday life that get overinterpreted and viewed as a characteristic of a disorder, they said.

For example, a new college student who experiences stress because they just moved into their dorm and forgot to do their summer reading may believe that they have developed an anxiety disorder, when they are instead reacting to the new stressors presented to them.

This is not to say that disorders should be gatekept or that these people’s concerns are invalid. The National Institute of Mental Health estimated that in 2022, 23.1% of the U.S. population, or over 1 in 5 people, suffer from mental illness, meaning it is not an uncommon occurrence.

However, it does call for a more nuanced education of the public, improved diagnostic criteria, and better infrastructure in order to properly assist those who need help and also to quell the concerns of those who think they do.

The problem is that this is going to take time, something that is rarely mentioned when discussing mental health awareness.

In 2022, 96% of U.S. public schools provided mental health services for their students, but 87% did not strongly agree that this help could reach all students in need, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

The reasons they cited for this included a lack of access to mental health professionals and inadequate funding.

Also in 2022, 6 out of 10 psychologists reported that they did not have any openings for new patients and 46% said they have been unable to meet the demand for treatment, according to an American Psychological Association (APA) survey.

While estimates vary depending on the study, the APA also reported that out of psychologists who keep waitlists, the average wait time can be longer than 3 months.

The ratio between demand for available professionals and new patients is going to take years to level out. Until then, advocates must be sure to mention this in order to temper expectations of those looking to get an immediate fix to their issues.

They must find ways to make sure people do not catastrophize and also to deal with overinterpreters. If they do not, these people could spend their time ruminating and worrying about issues they may not even have turning into real problems.

Folkes and Andrews say that an over-interpreter can form a “self-fulfilling prophecy” if they believe they have a condition. They can develop one down the road from anxiety surrounding the perceived condition or the acting out of certain characteristics of it.

One of the ways to mitigate these worries and slow down the rush for a diagnosis is to tone down harmful rhetoric on social media and encourage people to be patient and wait to speak with a professional in spite of long wait times.

A quick Instagram search for #mentalhealth will bring up 58.4 million tags and thousands of accounts, with many posting dumbed down definitions of disorders and simplified diagnosis criteria. Someone who has not yet spoken to a professional could identify with one of these loosely related symptoms and believe they have depression or anxiety.

This is no longer a niche community of people or limited to far pockets of social media — 55% of 1000 high school students said they have used social media to self diagnose themselves, according to a 2024 Edweek Research Center survey.

The research center conducted another survey of educators that echoed these findings, with 65% of 600 teachers and school district leaders saying they have seen students “sometimes” or “frequently” use social media to diagnose their mental health conditions.

Advocates must make sure they understand the responsibility they hold when it comes to spreading messages about such serious topics.

This responsibility also rests on everyday people. We must have the discipline to trust that our mental health professionals are doing the best they can and that awareness cannot lead to hyperfixation.

Dealing with these topics alone can be overwhelming and confusing, so looking out for friends and family from a place of objectivity is important so that they do not fall into one of the aforementioned pitfalls.