The Relationship Between Minority Student Organization Membership and Willingness to Seek Mental Health Treatment, Mediated by Ethnic Identity

Abstract

The following paper explored the relationship between ethnic minority student organization membership and involvement and willingness to seek professional mental health treatment, as mediated by ethnic identity. The hypotheses were that the greater the involvement in ethnic minority organizations, the greater the ethnic identity of the students, and that this mediator variable would be positively correlated with their attitudes toward seeking professional mental help. Independent sample t-tests comparing students involved and not involved in ethnic minority organizations found no statistically significant differences in help-seeking attitudes, but significant differences in ethnic identity. A linear regression with mediation analysis did not find significant correlations between degree of student involvement, ethnic identity, and help-seeking attitudes, but post-hoc LSD comparisons following a multivariate analysis of variance found significant race differences in help-seeking attitudes, with biracial/multiracial participants showing more willingness than Latinx/Hispanic participants to seek treatment. This study sheds light on the specific role student organizations may have on college initiatives to address mental health concerns on campus.