Testing positive, losing a loved one, and financial hardship: Real-world impacts of COVID-19 on US college student distress

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a particularly heavy toll on U.S. college students. In addition to facing academic-related stress and social pressures, these individuals are now increasingly susceptible to experiences such as contracting the virus, losing loved ones to COVID-19, or facing financial hardship due to the pandemic. The effects of such personal, pandemic-related experiences on young adult mental health — and the inherent racial disparities within these outcomes — remain largely understudied. We analyzed 65,568 undergraduate students from the Spring 2021 American College Health Association-National College Health Assessment (ACHA-NCHA). The rates of the aforementioned COVID-19-related stressors were unevenly distributed across racial groups. A logistic regression analysis to identify predictors of moderate and serious psychological distress revealed that participants who had experienced the death of a loved one had 1.14 times greater odds of developing psychological distress (p