Date of Award

5-1-2022

Language

English

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

College/School/Department

Department of Psychology

Program

Psychology (Masters)

Content Description

1 online resource (ii, 49 pages) : illustrations.

Dissertation/Thesis Chair

Ho Kwan Cheung

Committee Members

Jason Randall

Keywords

graduate students, higher education, mental health, mental health crisis, workaholism, Graduate students, Workaholism, Loneliness, Depression, Mental, Teacher-student relationships

Subject Categories

Psychology

Abstract

Graduate students are the principal proponents of academia and its ecosystem. In addition to challenging curriculums, teaching and research responsibilities, caregiving demands, and lingering student loans, graduate students are also particularly vulnerable to stress. These factors all adversely affect graduate students' mental health. Using longitudinal data from 247 graduate students over the span of six months, this study examines how self-reported depression and anxiety may influence graduate students’ workaholism through increased loneliness based on the mood congruency judgment effect. Further, graduate students are often surrounded by students in the same program and classes who share similar experiences and with whom they may become friends. The role these individuals play in their experiences is also examined. Findings revealed a significant main effect of depression on cognitive, emotional, and behavioral workaholism. There was also a significant main effect of anxiety on motivational, cognitive, emotional, and behavioral workaholism. In addition, depression and anxiety had a significant main effect on loneliness. Despite this, depression was found to have an indirect negative impact on motivational workaholism through loneliness. Lastly, there was no support for the moderating effect of workplace friendships for either the anxiety or depression model. The discussion section gives suggestions based on how faculty members can support students with mental health challenges. Future directions are provided regarding how researchers can further investigate the mental health of graduate students.

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