Résumé
Previous research has shown that help-seeking rates among students and athletes may depend on specific contextual factors such as location of help-seeking services, social support and institutional/organizational characteristics (Tashkandi et al., 2022; Carfagnini, 2024). One major barrier to increasing help-seeking utilization is a lack of resource visibility and awareness among students on campus (Davis et al., 2023). Therefore, the mental health awareness of an institution’s student population plays an important role in facilitating adequate help-seeking use. The current study aims to assess the mental health literacy and perceived institutional support of students based on varsity status, campus size and residence location. This study utilized the Canadian Campus Wellbeing Survey (CCWS) from data collected in the winter 2024 term (17,685 students). Self-reported 6-point Likert scale questions based on seeking campus resources and perceived institution support were compared using factorial ANOVA models. Results indicated that students at small (4.40) and medium (4.61) campuses had a better understanding of where to seek help compared to larger campuses (4.20). A similar trend was found with respect to perceived institutional support. Varsity athletes had a better understanding of campus mental health resources (4.49 vs. 4.32) as well as higher perceived institutional support (4.27 vs. 4.01). Findings suggest that lower help-seeking rates at larger campuses may be a product of lower overall mental health awareness. Additionally, despite similar help-seeking rates compared to non-athletes, varsity athletes seem to have similar or slightly better mental health awareness compared to non-varsity athletes (Cosh et al., 2024).
