In recent years, receiving a college degree has become increasingly difficult. Colleges have lower acceptance rates than ever before, record-breaking numbers of applicants, and higher grades requirements for admission. However, the stress does not cease once senior high school students are admitted into a university. The pressure to perform well in college and obtain the highest GPA possible can be extremely overwhelming, especially as students gravitate toward a more survival-of-the-fittest type college experience—meaning that students are competing against each other to obtain the best rank in their class. The implementation of “grade deflation”, a term used to describe a strict number of each letter grade given out in a class, puts students in direct competition with each other for their grades (Pham, 2012). For example, if all 30 students in a class were to receive above 90% on an exam, which would normally be an “A” letter grade, one instance of grade deflation could be that only the top 6 students receive “A’s”. This would mean that the rest of the class’ letter grades would be lowered in order to meet the strict grade deflation requirements. Grade deflation has been seen in top universities such as Princeton, UPenn and MIT, and starts as early as high school—notably in prestigious schools like Gunn High School, a Stanford-feeder school in Palo Alto that has one of the highest suicide rates in the United States (Wang, 2016). The increased competition and cutthroat nature of college has been linked to a tremendous amount of stress-related mental health issues and suicides among college students; but why does this all occur? Why does stress have such a negative impact on college students? And how does it affect their mental health?
The competitive modern-day collegiate system inclines students to work against each other, rather than with each other. Placing students in direct competition with each other creates a social hierarchy based on GPA, since their GPA will inevitably determine their success after college. With the implementation of grade deflation, students’ ability to obtain the GPA they desire is based off of how well they perform relative to their peers. This whole phenomenon—rankings based on how someone compares to others—is the staple of social comparison theory. This situation with college students is specifically upward social comparison, which is when people compare themselves to others who they view as better than themselves. After students compare themselves to their peers who are “better” in their eyes, these students’ self-esteem will suffer greatly, leading to negative, demeaning thoughts. Essentially, the competitive nature of college causes students who aren’t at the top of their class to react negatively to stress, lowering their self-esteem during self-evaluation and leading to mental health issues like depression and suicide.
From an evolutionary perspective, the relationship between upward social comparison and resulting depression has been examined in a study by Thwaites and Dagnan of North Cumbria Mental Health and Learning Disabilities. Depression, in this evolutionary sense, is caused by the failure to obtain high social ranking, making a person a less attractive mate (Thwaites & Dagnan, 2004). The study recruited 174 subjects from 17 to 66 years of age, and each subject was measured by the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and the Social Comparison and Interest Scale (SCIS). The Beck Depression Inventory measures a subject’s symptoms of depression by assessing their attitude through a series of 21 items (American Psychological Association, 2017). The BDI is one measure used to quantitatively assess a person’s level of depressive symptoms. On the other hand, the Social Comparison and Interest Scale rates a person’s attitudes based on 10 different topics of social comparison, returning a quantitative score as well (Thwaites & Dagnan, 2004). Through the use of BDI and SCIS, the study concluded a link between the importance placed on attracting others’ interest and level of depression: the higher the importance placed on attracting others’ interest, the higher the level of depressive symptoms observed in an individual. The results of this study can be extrapolated to college students, in the sense that the heightened competition due to grade deflation and limited job opportunities forces college students to place a higher importance on attracting the interest of employers. Therefore, these students socially compare themselves to their peers more often, leading to a higher likelihood of depressive symptoms, as observed in the study by Thwaites and Dagnan. This evolutionary perspective of depression in relation to social comparison supports the theory that grade deflation causes college students to react negatively to stress by worrying about how their social standing relative to their peers will be affected.
In close relation with depression, many students, due to the stressful nature of college, consider or attempt suicide at some point throughout their academic career. In a paper by Scott Lingen of the Wright Institute Graduate School of Psychology entitled “Risk and Resilience: Suicide Crises in University Populations”, the direct relationship between suicide attempts and GPA is explored in regard to the overwhelmingly stressful college environment. The paper puts GPA into a quantitative perspective with regard to suicide, stating that students who had considered suicide had significantly lower GPAs than those who have never considered suicide (Lingen, 2011). As an extension of this data, the paper additionally mentions that students who have attempted suicide had a significantly lower GPA than those who have only considered suicide (Lingen, 2011). Essentially, this draws a direct, numerical relationship between GPA and severity of suicide ideations. Although only an association, the data suggests that the failure to obtain a desired GPA increases risk for suicide. One plausible explanation for this phenomenon would be that failing to obtain a high GPA leads to a low self-esteem due to social comparison. When a student believes their GPA is subpar compared to their peers, they become overwhelmed with stress about a variety of circumstances relating to their grades, such as graduate school admissions and job offers. The resulting low self-esteem then causes students to experience feelings of helplessness and hopelessness, inevitably leading to suicide ideation. Grade deflation, in its nature, lowers students’ GPA based on relativity; and since low GPA has been linked to severity of suicide ideation, this means that schools implementing grade deflation are directly increasing risk of suicide in their students.
Although the relationship between upward social comparison, depression, and suicide is strikingly present among college students, it is necessary to note additional risk factors that contribute to students’ negative reactions to stress. In a paper from the University of Washington, Heather Murphy explores the elevated risk of suicide for gay, lesbian and bisexual (GLB) college students. GLB college students were found to attempt suicide three times more often than heterosexual students (Murphy, 2007). Among these GLB students, females were three times more likely to attempt suicide than males as well (Murphy, 2007). Most of suicide risk for GLB students, as described in this paper, were due to victimization, in which students are targeted and humiliated. Victimization inevitably leads to harsh self-evaluation and low self-esteem, similar to the effects of upward social comparison in regard to academic success. Both increased competition and other risk factors such as victimization for GLB students collaboratively influence depression and suicide in college. No one factor can be solely deemed as the cause for depression and suicide in college students; however, there are specific significant risk factors supported by empirical evidence—one of these notably being low GPA. The risk for GLB students essentially intensifies and increases the effect that unsuccessful academics will have on mental health. If GLB students already have a lower self-esteem due to the victimization that they have been dealing with throughout their life, then they are more prone to have their self-esteem hurt even more if they are not performing well in school. If by upward social comparison GLB students believe they are inadequate due to their GPA and grade deflation, then risks for suicide are extremely more likely, as combined risk factors have additive effects. In all, identifying as GLB and the combined effect of competition and grade deflation on students’ mental health undoubtedly multiplies the risk for suicide ideation through upward social comparison.
Furthermore, as the United States collegiate system emphasizes competition more and more, students are forced to work in opposition to each other, not in collaboration. With job opportunities becoming less available with even stricter qualifications, college environments have become cutthroat, to the point of grade deflation. The implementation of grade deflation inevitably leads to upward social comparison between students, since their grades depend on the performance of their peers (Pham, 2012). These comparisons result in a lowered self-esteem and other psychiatric conditions, as a result of receiving lower than expected grades and a decrease in perceived self-worth. Students who place significantly more importance on attracting the interest of others—for example, job employers—experience more depressive symptoms than those who are not preoccupied with these social comparisons (Thwaites & Dagnan, 2004). Closely linked with depression, students who receive lower GPAs are more likely to experience different levels of suicide ideation (Lingen, 2011) . By implementing grade deflation in colleges, the school is consequently increasing risk for suicide through the lowering of GPAs. However, GPA is not the only factor contributing to suicidal tendencies in college students. Other predisposed risks such as identifying as gay, lesbian or bisexual increase susceptibility for low GPA to cause suicide ideation through the multiplied effect of additive risk (Murphy, 2007). Until universities move away from the cutthroat nature of grade deflation, risk for suicide among students will continue to increase, leading to far more heartbreaking tragedies in colleges across the country.