The Project

As part of this project, the (mental) health of students and, following a relationship-oriented approach, the study conditions as well as other organisational conditions at universities that have a potentially stressful or sponsoring influence are examined. While there are numerous studies on individual influencing factors, such as the health skills or health behaviour of students, there has been less focus on organisational conditions to date. However, analysing these factors is a prerequisite for a risk assessment of mental stress and is essential for deriving structural measures.

For this purpose, the university-specific and relationship-oriented survey instrument "Bielefeld Questionnaire on Study Conditions and Health" is being used at universities nationwide and further developed in parallel based on practical experience. In this way, organisational resources and stresses at the universities surveyed that influence the (mental) health of students can be identified. Based on the resulting findings, stress factors can be reduced with sustainable concepts and programmes (e.g. in the context of risk assessments of mental stress) and resource factors can be developed accordingly. Surveyed universities are systematically networked within the framework of this project and can exchange information in regular hits of the university network and benefit from an exchange of experiences and shared "lessons learnt " relating to the survey process.

A further aim of the practical application is the development of a university database on study conditions and health. In order to enable the surveyed universities to better categorise their results, comparative values will be generated as a benchmark for participating universities. Based on the data obtained from the nationwide student surveys, initial cross-university trends and prevention approaches can also be derived. The research questions essentially relate to organisational factors, i.e. framework conditions that can be influenced by the universities. Accordingly, no focus is placed on personal framework conditions and the framework conditions of other organisations, such as the Studierendenwerk [Association for Student Affairs], are not initially focused on.

 

1. Which framework and study conditions at universities are associated with the mental health of students and are there factors that in turn influence these associations?
2. Which specific organisational factors ("drivers") have the strongest influence (resources and stresses) on the mental health of students at universities and are therefore starting points for measures? Where do students see the main need for action? What opportunities for synergies (common "levers") can be identified for relationship prevention from a joint consideration of data from surveys at workplaces and study places as a whole?
3. Can the Bielefeld company model based on the social capital approach be adapted in relation to study conditions?

 

The overall project is managed and coordinated by Bielefeld University's Health Management department. Not only can it look back on a long and successful tradition in the field of health - in 1994, for example, Bielefeld University was the first university to define health promotion for employees and students as a central target area of its organisational culture and was awarded the Corporate Health Award in the "Healthy University" category in 2013 for outstanding academic achievements in health management. Since then, Bielefeld University has also repeatedly acted as a driving force for trends and developments in the field of health management at universities.

In addition, Bielefeld University's health management team has already carried out extensive preparatory work for this project, which is now being built upon: The commitment to the topic area of risk assessment of mental stress was sponsored by the Unfallkasse (UK) NRW with third-party funding from 2013 to 2016. The result was the development, testing and validation of a questionnaire adapted to the university context to assess psychosocial stress and resources in the university workplace, as well as the development and initial testing of a university-specific and sustainable procedure for dealing with psychosocial stress and resources in the university workplace. As part of subsequent funding from the DGUV's research funding programme from 2016 to 2019, the instrument was used nationwide and a comprehensive database was established.

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During the current project period, Bielefeld University is focussing on advising, supporting and networking interested and surveying universities in all aspects of the survey process. In addition to the optimal adaptation of the respective survey and framing processes to the specific circumstances and conditions of the surveying university, this also includes support in the preparation of follow-up processes relating to the communication of results and the derivation of measures, as well as the moderation of the university network and invitations to regular exchange meetings.

Bielefeld University is also responsible for the systematic further development of the questionnaire (in the sense of a "learning instrument") as part of the practical trials. The further development takes place in close coordination with the cooperation partners at Charité Berlin and, in addition to important impulses from the practice of the surveying universities, primarily takes up relevant (e.g. social or higher education policy) developments - such as the current significant changes in study conditions due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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The project management is the responsibility of the health management coordinator, Julia Burian (M.Sc. Psychologist). As an occupational and organisational psychologist and solution-focused consultant and thanks to her many years of previous work in the research projects on the Bielefeld questionnaire for employees at universities sponsored by the UK NRW and the DGUV, among others, she has sound practical experience that she can draw on when supervising the further development of the questionnaire and advising and networking universities.

In addition, Zita Deptolla (B.Sc. Sociologist) supports the focal points located at Bielefeld University. Due to her parallel work in the project on the Bielefeld questionnaire for employees at universities, she also has relevant practical experience and can also point out interfaces and synchronisation possibilities in the context of survey coordination, university networking and adaptation of the survey instrument to the respective circumstances.

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The persons to contact at Bielefeld University can be reached at fragebogen-studierende@uni-bielefeld.de.

 

The IGPW of Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, one of the leading medical Faculties in Europe and a member of the Berlin University Alliance and recognised as a University of Excellence, is responsible for the scientific coordination of the project. Prof Dr Christiane Stock and Dr Katherina Heinrichs will contribute their expertise in terms of content and research methodology to this project. Both researchers have been conducting research in the field of student health and health promotion in the university setting for many years, have already realised a large number of important projects in this area and thus contribute broad research experience in the field of conducting surveys and statistically analysing survey data as well as in the development, implementation and evaluation of interventions in the university setting. In addition, as a health scientist, Jennifer Lehnchen implements the focal points located at Charité Berlin and is the contact person for survey analyses and the cross-university database, among other things.

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The cooperation partners at Charité Berlin are primarily responsible for conducting the online surveys using the "Lime Survey" platform and subsequently analysing and processing the survey results for the respective universities surveyed. This data is optimised for independent use at the universities in order to enable long-term continuity of the processes beyond the project period, among other things.

Charité Berlin is also responsible for the design, development and maintenance of a cross-university database on study conditions and health. On the one hand, this serves to create comparative values in the sense of an external benchmark, which is reported back to the surveyed universities in addition to their own survey results. On the other hand, the cross-university comparative values are used to formulate initial statements on conditions at study places, which, among other things, provide accident insurance institutions with specific information on central sources of stress and resources of students and can thus justify prioritisation, e.g. in the area of situational prevention. This also includes - in close coordination with Bielefeld University's health management - the development and implementation of a corresponding research strategy and the preparation of research results for communication to the (subject) public.

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The project will be accompanied throughout its entire duration by an independent advisory research committee. This committee was put together with the involvement of diverse and relevant expertise from science and practice and explicitly includes the perspective of the target group of students themselves. Regular exchanges and the use of the expertise pooled here serve to ensure quality assurance and support the achievement of this project's objectives.

The support group is made up of the following members:

• Fritz, Bente Marie (B. Sc. programme in Health Sciences, Charité Berlin)
• Grumbach, Hans-Joachim, Dr (Department of Universities and Research Institutions, DGUV)
• Huxholl, Hannah (Department "Safety and Health", DGUV)
• Maas, Lena (M. Sc. Psychology programme, Bielefeld University)
• Mikolajczyk, Rafael, Prof. Dr (Institute of Medical Epidemiology, Biometry and Informatics, MLU Halle)
• Orrie, Andrew (Department "Safety and Health", DGUV)
• Pischke, Claudia, Prof. Dr (Institute for Medical Sociology, HHU Düsseldorf)
• Ender, Loreen (Department of Universities, UK NRW)