Doctoral students’ access to non-academic support for mental health
Doctoral students’ access to non-academic support for mental health
Increased doctoral student numbers has led to a growth in studies dedicated to doctoral experience. These studies have raised a range of mental health concerns around workload, supervision processes and student well-being. Despite these challenges being well documented, few studies have looked at doctoral student’s experiences of accessing non-academic support services. This article presents the findings of a mixed-method study to investigate doctoral experiences of non-academic support, conducted at one British university with a large postgraduate research population. Drawing on focus groups and a student survey, the article concludes that many doctoral students are not accessing institutional support when they could benefit from it, with many turning to external support mechanisms including family, personal doctor and online resources. Five institutional recommendations are proposed to develop improved dedicated doctoral student mental health support: clear signposting, online self-help, workshops, parity of support and supervisor training.
390-412
Waight, Emma
d6ec80e6-81fb-49b5-b43e-159fe4ca85f5
Giordano, Aline
776ad6d6-578d-46b8-a6a8-0471d97d7dc0
Waight, Emma
d6ec80e6-81fb-49b5-b43e-159fe4ca85f5
Giordano, Aline
776ad6d6-578d-46b8-a6a8-0471d97d7dc0
Waight, Emma and Giordano, Aline
(2018)
Doctoral students’ access to non-academic support for mental health.
Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 40 (4), .
(doi:10.1080/1360080X.2018.1478613).
Abstract
Increased doctoral student numbers has led to a growth in studies dedicated to doctoral experience. These studies have raised a range of mental health concerns around workload, supervision processes and student well-being. Despite these challenges being well documented, few studies have looked at doctoral student’s experiences of accessing non-academic support services. This article presents the findings of a mixed-method study to investigate doctoral experiences of non-academic support, conducted at one British university with a large postgraduate research population. Drawing on focus groups and a student survey, the article concludes that many doctoral students are not accessing institutional support when they could benefit from it, with many turning to external support mechanisms including family, personal doctor and online resources. Five institutional recommendations are proposed to develop improved dedicated doctoral student mental health support: clear signposting, online self-help, workshops, parity of support and supervisor training.
This record has no associated files available for download.
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 13 May 2018
e-pub ahead of print date: 29 May 2018
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 421355
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/421355
ISSN: 1360-080X
PURE UUID: 97b30658-be8c-4879-9227-0bd9750917dc
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 05 Jun 2018 16:30
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 20:13
Export record
Altmetrics
Contributors
Author:
Aline Giordano
Download statistics
Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.
View more statistics