Mental health problems are on the rise among UK academics amid the pressures of greater job insecurity, constant demand for results and an increasingly marketised higher education system.Commercialisation is coming, and it’s causing stress. Oh noes!
University counselling staff and workplace health experts have seen a steady increase in numbers seeking help for mental health problems over the past decade, with research indicating nearly half of academics show symptoms of psychological distress.David Thompson always has a wonderful selection of academics showing symptoms of psychological something…
Dr Alan Swann of Imperial College London, chair of the higher education occupational physicians committee, blamed "demands for increased product and productivity" for rising levels of mental health problems among academics.
He says: "They all have to produce results – you are only as good as your research rating or as good as your ability to bring in funding for research."Ah. You mean, they are making university life mirror real life? How awful!
Research by Gail Kinman, professor of occupational health psychology at the University of Bedfordshire … points to poor work-life balance as a key factor, with academics putting in increasing hours as they attempt to respond to high levels of internal and external scrutiny, a fast pace of change and the notion of students as customers – leading to demands such as 24-hour limit for responses to student queries.Yes, the ‘notion of students as customers’ is the real problem. For countless years, they’ve been considered merely pawns in the delivery of ever more wacky theories, and now they are valued customers!
Oh, it's all too much! Pass the sick leave form, I'm too stressed to carry on!
You left out the stress of perpetual grantseeking for unnecessary and obscure research into the utterly irrelevant.
ReplyDeleteFascists! It's genocide, just like in Cambodia when intellectuals were either killed or forced to work on the land (although worse, obviously, because Pol Pot wasn't a white capitalist so at least his people of colour weren't subjected to hate crime).
ReplyDeleteTo whom should I apply for a Grant to conduct some academic research into the problem?
ReplyDeleteOn the whole I agree but one aspect of being seen to be busy is really damaging.
ReplyDeleteThe pressure to publish numerous papers means that more and more plagiarized, trivial, faked and other assorted waste of space papers are being produced - many of the worst including the phrase "in the context of climate change".
Quality rather than quantity would be a far better yardstick.
Dr Alan Swann of Imperial College London, chair of the higher education occupational physicians committee, blamed "demands for increased product and productivity" for rising levels of mental health problems among academics.
ReplyDeleteHe says: "They all have to produce results
The horror!
Swann is a prime example of the milquetoast society that we now enjoy.
"I've worked in the private sector, they expect results!"
ReplyDelete"You left out the stress of perpetual grantseeking for unnecessary and obscure research into the utterly irrelevant."
ReplyDeleteGood point. And where's my flying car, damn it!
"Swann is a prime example of the milquetoast society that we now enjoy. "
We really are heading for some sort of 'point of no return', U fear.
If we haven't already crossed it.