







































Humanitas: Indonesian Psychological Journal  
Vol. 20 (2), August 2023, 136-148 

ISSN:  2598-6368(online); 1693-7236(print)                                                                 

       humanitas@psy.uad.ac.id             http://journal1.uad.ac.id/index.php/Humanitas           https://doi.org/10.26555/humanitas.v20i2.341 

   

University students' barriers to managing mental health during the 

COVID-19 pandemic: A qualitative exploration 

F. A. Nurdiyanto1, Irene Miracle Philian Goszal2, Enggar Putri Harjanti1 

1Faculty of Psychology, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia 
2Faculty of Psychology, Satya Wacana Christian University, Indonesia 

Corresponding Author: franznur@gmail.com  
 

 

Introduction 

COVID-19 was first confirmed in Wuhan, China, on 31 December 2019. SARS-CoV-2 virus 

propagation causes respiratory problems resulting in pneumonia, acute respiratory syndrome, 

kidney failure, and death (Kementerian Kesehatan RI, 2020). In Indonesia, 4,256,409 cases 

of COVID-19 were confirmed by 30 November 2021, with death counts up to 143,830 (World 

Health Organization [WHO], 2022). The increased number of COVID-19 cases drove the 

government to implement mobility restrictions to suppress COVID-19 transmission 

(Kementerian Kesehatan RI, 2020). This policy caused changes in people's activities and 

mobility, such as engaging more online, learning from home, working from home, and 

abstaining from social gatherings. Communities are also instructed to implement health 

protocols, such as washing hands, wearing masks, maintaining distance, staying away from 

crowds, and mobility restrictions. This restriction on mobility during the COVID-19 

pandemic led the world to problems such as socioeconomic threats (Kramer & Kramer, 2020) 

and mental health issues (Lim et al., 2022). 

ARTICLE  INFO  

 

ABST RACT  

 

Article history 

Received January 17, 2023 

Revised April 9, 2023 

Accepted June 10, 2023 

 The COVID-19 pandemic and its mitigation efforts are associated 
with increased student mental health problems such as anxiety, stress, 
isolation, and lack of motivation. When left untreated, these 
conditions could affect students' well-being, academic achievement, 
social relations, and quality of life. This study aimed to explore 
university students' barriers to managing mental health during the 
COVID-19 pandemic using an explorative qualitative approach. A 
total of 310 students from various regions in Indonesia were recruited 
by purposive sampling. Data was collected by distributing qualitative 
questionnaires through a Google form containing informed consent, 
demographic data, and open-ended questions. Thematic analysis was 
applied to identify the patterns of the meaning of students' barriers. 
The barriers experienced by students in managing mental health 
during the pandemic are a lack of support from their closest people, 
restricted mobility, stigmatization, and individual characteristics. The 
results show support from family and closest friends is essential for 
managing students' mental health, especially when there is limited 
access to mobility and social interaction. Additionally, adaptability 
and disclosure are also seen to be crucial for students in managing 
their mental health. This study suggests a campaign for mental health 
literacy and providing accessible mental health services for students 
in crisis. 

 

    

 
Keywords 

COVID-19 pandemic; 

explorative qualitative;  

mental health barriers; 
university students.  

 

mailto:humanitas@psy.uad.ac.id
http://journal1.uad.ac.id/index.php/Humanitas
https://doi.org/10.26555/humanitas.v20i2.341
mailto:franznur@gmail.com


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Various mental health problems have been reported during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

A survey estimated around 55% of the population in Indonesia suffered from an anxiety 

disorder, and 58% underwent depressive disorder during the pandemic (Suriastiani et al., 

2020). At the time, anxiety was a form of distress related to health threats; it changed sleeping 

and eating habits, caused difficulty concentrating, and deteriorated health status (Kaligis et 

al., 2020). Anxiety and depression during the pandemic have also increased by 25%, related 

to distress arising from social isolation (Ren et al., 2020). The qualitative survey also 

identified that the pandemic has led to psychological problems such as depression, emotional 

anxiety, and pandemic stress (Nurdiyanto & Harjanti, 2022). Throughout the pandemic, 

women are more likely to experience mental health problems and lean more toward the 

suicidal trend (Nurdiyanto et al., 2022). 

Mobility restrictions and isolation also brought psychological impacts, particularly in 

young adults (Carpio-Arias et al., 2022). Mental health problems often emerge during the 

most vulnerable developmental period of life (e.g., at 18-25 years old), typically college 

students (McLafferty et al., 2021). Those entering a transitional period, be it psychologically, 

socially, or in terms of taking responsibility instead (Jurewicz, 2015), are sustaining pandemic 

stress, placing them into a state of crisis. College students can be psychologically and socially 

stressed in terms of taking responsibility, which already puts them in a distressed situation 

before the pandemic.  

Meanwhile, during the pandemic, students feel more complex grievances with 

increased anxiety, stress, isolation, and lack of motivation. A study revealed that 50% of the 

student population sustained anxiety and depression equally significant to the stress due to 

restrictions during the pandemic, which led to decreased exercise, deteriorating personal 

relationships, social activity restrictions, and financial problems (Chen & Lucock, 2022). 

Learning migration into online classes is strongly suspected of causing student distress by 

disrupting social interaction and adaptation to learning techniques (Chaturvedi et al., 2021); 

online courses are also considered to limit students in obtaining potential supporting 

resources. 

Drastic changes in the learning system cause students to have difficulties adapting to 

new learning models as they are unprepared to deal with such changes. Students felt bored 

after the second week of online learning and endured anxiety as well as mood swings due to 

limited social interaction and a learning process perceived as ineffective (Irawan et al., 2020). 

Academic burdens, boredom, monotonous activities, independent isolation, COVID-19 

infection, and disruption in their daily activities magnified students’ mental health struggles 

(Wiguna et al., 2020). In distressed circumstances, the student's mental health management 

is also influenced by negative thoughts about oneself and others, thus requiring specific 

treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic (Roca et al., 2021). 

Unfortunately, the pandemic gave students increasingly limited mental health services 

access. Mobility restriction has directly prevented students toward service demand from 

accessing assistance, especially in isolation or areas with limited service (Badrfam et al., 

2020). Quarantine and isolation are the oldest and most effective ways to prevent disease 

transmission and suppress the propagation of the pandemic. It separates, limits, and prevents 

infected people from traveling to or health people from infected areas (Badrfam et al., 2020). 

Thus, quarantine challenges those with enduring mental health problems and crises in a 

pandemic, particularly during tightening regulations, closing public services, limiting 

mobility, and prohibiting gatherings. Isolation has become a constraint in finding mental 

health help (Ganesan et al., 2021). Isolation turns out to have negative implications, especially 

for people with psychological problems, such as anxiety, stress, fear, reactive behavior, 



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boredom, sadness, worry, helplessness, loneliness, and depression (Ganesan et al., 2021; 

Loades et al., 2020). 

By definition, barriers to health are anything that makes it difficult for individuals to 

access, use, or benefit from health services (Scheppers et al., 2006). Impartial views on the 

importance of mental health, social stigma, self-closure, the desire to solve their problems, 

and ignorance regarding information in accessing psychological assistance are common 

barriers to managing mental health (Topkaya, 2015). In addition, students' attitudes toward 

mental health assistance and their perceptions of finding help have greatly influenced how 

students manage their mental health (Yakunina & Weigold, 2011). During the pandemic, 

mental health service is not perceptive to the need for services conforming to a crisis (Feijt et 

al., 2020) and have become even more inaccessible in remote areas with inadequate 

infrastructure. The low levels of mental health literacy add to the barriers shown by the high 

stigmatization of mental health (Maya, 2021) and the perception of mental health issues as 

tertiary issues. Mental health access and availability in Indonesia remain limited, and mental 

health workers are not evenly distributed throughout Indonesia (Sari et al., 2020). During the 

pandemic, the implementation of mental health policy is increasingly facing challenges and 

limitations on service access and coverage problems (Ridlo, 2020). 

A person is considered mentally healthy if they can realize their ability, cope with 

various stresses in life, work productively and helpfully, and contribute to the people 

surrounding them (World Health Organization [WHO], 2004). Mental health can be achieved 

through satisfying social relationships (Bailey et al., 2018). Nevertheless, students who 

cannot manage their mental health are at risk of severe emotional tensions, impairing their 

well-being (Nasrullah & Sulaiman, 2021). This research is intended to explore the barriers 

students encounter in managing their mental health, particularly during the COVID-19 

pandemic. Identifying the students' barriers is crucial to determining the correct treatment 

strategy to overcome those obstacles. Knowing what causes student failure to manage mental 

health problems will make determining the proper intervention strategy easier. 

Method 

Research Design  

This research employed an open-ended qualitative questionnaire and focused on what 

hindered students' aspects in managing their mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

As with qualitative health studies using questionnaires (Barcham & Stephens, 1980; Zhao et 

al., 1997), this approach allowed us to understand the participants' views about mental health 

barriers during the COVID-19 pandemic. This specific design has the advantage of involving 

diverse participants, especially considering the pandemic's mobility restrictions. An open-

ended questionnaire gave participants a free space to describe their experiences using written 

answers. 

Participants 

Participants were recruited using the purposive sampling method with these criteria: 1) aged 

19-25 years, 2) undergraduate or diploma program students, and 3) during the COVID-19 

pandemic living in Indonesia. This report was a sequel to our previous study (Nurdiyanto & 

Harjanti, 2022) related to psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic. At first, we 

recruited 728 participants. However, only 310 participants (Mage = 20.6; SDage = 2.16) could 

be further analyzed due to the ineligibility of participants, such as those under and over age, 



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not university students, or not reporting any mental health issues in participants’ self-report. 

Table 1 shows the demographic of the participants.  
 

Table 1  

Participant Demographic (N=310) 
Characteristics N f (%) Characteristics N f (%) 

Sex   Religion     

Female 207 66.77 Buddhist 2 .64 

Male 99 31.93 Hindus 3 .96 

N/A 4 1.29 Muslim 73 23.54 

Age   Catholic 39 12.58 

19 – 21 255 82.25 Christian 182 58.70 

22 – 25  55 17.74 N/A 11 3.54 

Procedure 

Data was collected by distributing qualitative questionnaires through the Google form 

containing 1) research informed consent, 2) participant information, and 3) open-ended 

questions. The survey was conducted between 15-30 November 2021 by sharing the links 

via WhatsApp, Twitter, and Facebook. At the beginning of the questionnaire, we briefly 

described the research, the research objective, the commitment to data privacy and 

confidentiality, and how the data will be used. This research was reviewed and approved by 

the Research Ethics Committee, Universitas Gadjah Mada (Number: 

KE/UGM/013/EC/2021). 

The questionnaire covered three open questions that explored psychological burdens, 

how participants manage their psychological burdens, and perceived obstacles in managing 

mental health. There was no word limitation in answering the question, and it allowed 

participants to elaborate as much as needed. The questions mentioned in the open-ended 

questionnaire are as follows: 

1. What are the psychological burdens you feel during the COVID-19 pandemic? 

2. How do you manage psychological burdens during the COVID-19 pandemic? 

3. What are the constraints in maintaining psychological health?  

Data Analysis 

The thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2019) was applied to identify, analyze, and report 

meaningful patterns in data. In conducting the analysis, the transcript was re-read to 

familiarize with the data. The answer sheet was read repeatedly to generate initial codes. The 

second and third authors built the potential themes and continuously reviewed them by the 

first author until they were refined towards saturation. All authors provided definitions and 

labeled the themes through panel discussions. 

Results 

Based on the data analysis of the open-ended questions, five themes were obtained related to 

constraints encountered by students in managing mental health during the COVID-19 

pandemic. The themes of barriers faced by students in managing mental health are 1) lack of 

social support, 2) mobility restriction, 3) information overload, 4) overburdened by 

assignments, and 5) lack of desire to disclose personal issues. 



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Lack of social support 

The COVID-19 pandemic required every student to spend their days in their residence 

(house, boarding, and dormitory). This circumstance is also followed by increasingly 

frequent interactions between family members within the household. During the interaction, 

participants and their families faced pandemic adaptation issues in their family environment. 

Therefore, participants still complain about their families' lack of support. Compounding the 

problems, participants were also faced with their personal pandemic adaptation issues in 

their family environment. As expressed by one of the female students when asked about the 

barriers to maintaining psychological health, 

" Family and parents. They did not understand or perhaps did not care about 

their children's mental health. Sometimes parents are also one of the reasons I 

have a psychological burden." (RESP-203, 20 years, female) 

Participants expect emotional support from their families, particularly during the 

pandemic adaptation to online learning with its burdens and challenges. Unfortunately, the 

participants perceived that their parents, on the contrary, were the reason they had a 

psychological burden during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants even felt that their 

parents did not care about their children's mental health, including new activities carried out 

at home during stay-at-home instructions. Besides support from family, participants expect 

support from friends during the pandemic. Participants need support from their friends, who 

are considered the closest person to help them overcome lecture problems such as academic 

assignments, campus activities, or other time-consuming activities. However, limited 

interaction and adaptation to each individual at the start of the pandemic meant that the need 

for peer support was impossible. Another participant stated that she did not get enough aid 

from her social environment. She says, 

"My social circles, such as my college friends and playmates, were not 

supportive (to solve problems)." (RESP-01, 19 years, female) 

Mobility restrictions 

Restrictions on mobility during the COVID-19 pandemic have made access difficult for 

travel and social interaction. Restrictions prevented participants from carrying out activities 

freely as they used to before the pandemic. Every access to travel, carry out activities, and 

meet colleagues is limited, as stated by a female participant, 

"There are not many obstacles, but what is most striking is not being able to meet 

other people for an uncertain time, which in my opinion is long enough." (RESP-

220, 19 years, female) 

Participants perceive the problem as a result of no unity or interaction with other 

people in the long term. Participants also found it challenging to limit the specified mobility 

because it caused them to be unable to get out of boredom, fatigue, or just for refreshment, 

as written by a student, 

"My obstacle is that I still cannot cope with stress well. Because I usually cope 

with stress by having a picnic on the beach or going to the mall. Therefore, even 

though I do my hobbies at home, the reality is that it does not guarantee that I 

can overcome my psychological problems." (RESP-302, 19 years, female) 

Mobility restriction also affected participants' barriers to dealing with stress because, 

for some people, going out is a strategy they always do in coping with distress. The impact 

of this mobility restriction then influences student strategies in managing their mental health. 



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Information overload 

The excess of information was related to a large amount of COVID-19 news from various 

sources rolling fast in society. Meanwhile, the information spread among the public did not 

entirely come from reliable sources. As said by the participant, 

"I cannot filter the news about COVID-19. Moreover, the people around me 

always keep up with it and talk about it." (RESP-99, 19 years, female) 

Excessive information about COVID-19 forms negative thoughts and generates fear 

and anxiety, impacting an individual's mental health. Furthermore, the surrounding 

environment and the media contributed to the participants overthinking about the pandemic. 

As stated by a student, 

"The influence of mass media coverage is always exaggerated." (RESP-507, 21 

years, female) 

The news about the number of death cases that are continuously reported and 

misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic caused participants to have negative 

perceptions about COVID-19, resulting in fear of being infected by the virus. This 

information overload of COVID-19 also affected how individuals deal with mental health. 

Fear of excessive information led participants to limit meetings with health workers, 

including seeking treatment at health services. They are more focused on handling 

emergency diseases. In the context of a pandemic, mental health problems tend to be 

considered tertiary to get treatment from professionals. 

Overburdened by assignments 

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought many changes in activities, so adapting to the current 

situation is necessary. However, we found that fast changes, unaccompanied by the 

development of the academic system, create learning activities considered to be unoptimized 

for students. Consequently, learning activities are full of assignments instead of class 

discussions. Therefore, the most frequent perceived changes were related to the lecture 

challenges faced by the participants. As stated by a student, 

" Lecture assignment. It is not easy to interact directly, but assignments keep 

coming. I cannot manage my psychological issues. I just played games. It feels 

like during this pandemic; there are more lecture assignments now than before." 

(RESP-162, 21 years, male) 

Participants felt burdened by changing lectures, which were initially held offline and 

now changed to online during the pandemic. Participants admitted they needed help dividing 

their time; consequently, activities and assignments were neglected. Difficulties in adapting 

can also be seen from the lack of time management that students have during the pandemic, 

as expressed by students, 

"I cannot manage time management. Plenty of homework and campus 

activities." (RESP-141, 21 years, female) 

Lack of desire to disclose personal issues 

A lack of desire for self-disclosure can hinder seeking mental health assistance. This finding 

also revealed that the tendency to shut oneself down when encountering problems could 

hinder handling mental health during a pandemic. One participant said that he could not 

share personal issues with other people, 

"I am not open to sharing problems with others. I prefer to keep everything to 

myself" (RESP-250, 19 years, male) 



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Participants feel that hiding problems is better than telling others, including family. 

Parents and the closest people are considered unable to become an outlet to share problems 

with during this pandemic. Besides, other participants chose to keep their problems to 

themselves, as stated by the following student, 

"There are some internal pressures that we cannot tell others, so we keep it to 

ourselves." (RESP-229, 19 years, female) 

Participants feel pressure from within themselves that cannot be shared with other 

people, including friends; hence, they feel better about keeping their problems hidden. This 

character tends to prevent students from seeking help to solve their mental health problems. 

Discussion 

This study explored obstacles to managing mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

University students encountered constraints related to changing patterns during a pandemic, 

including a lack of social support from those closest to them, mobility restrictions, 

information overload, overburdened assignments, and a lack of desire to self-disclosure. 

Notably, adolescents with limited social support have little access to mental health assistance 

(Jose et al., 2012), placing them in more complex psychological problems. In this context, 

the social connection can lead to seeking mental health assistance. A previous study 

highlighted that limited interaction and mobility lead to overwhelming emotional impact 

(loneliness, boredom, and anxiety) and loneliness issues in student life (Nurdiyanto & 

Harjanti, 2022). 

Strong social support is one of the buffers for mental health when a person undergoes 

a life crisis (Dalgard et al., 1995). Social support from family and friends predicts student 

quality of life (Alsubaie et al., 2019). It reduces mental health deterioration when adverse life 

events occur, especially those related to conditions that individuals feel they are unable to 

control (Jose & Lim, 2014). Social relationships with quality peers positively contribute to 

adolescents' mental health (Santini et al., 2021). Unfortunately, social support is one of many 

that students complain about in maintaining their mental health during the pandemic, 

especially with domestic problems and violence, which surprisingly increased during the 

lockdown period (Olding et al., 2021). The financial crisis during the pandemic also led to 

tensions between family members (Westrupp et al., 2023). 

The experience of a pandemic with mobility restrictions could be considered an adverse 

life event. Research during the early pandemic confirmed various adverse effects, especially 

for the marginalized, such as those at risk of unemployment, food insufficiency, cancellation 

of offline classes, and mental health problems (Chakrabarti et al., 2021). Mobility restrictions 

are associated with declining mental health, marked by unhealthy eating behaviors and 

worsening sleep quality, with groups of young people and women being more at risk (Carpio-

Arias et al., 2022). However, the impact of lockdown on mental health varies; with high 

mortality rates, lockdown no longer causes mental health to worsen but has an influence on 

high anxiety and depression alongside high mortality rates (Costa-Font et al., 2023). During 

the restrictions, students cannot carry out activities they usually do as coping strategies when 

facing problems. Our study underlines that mobility restrictions are also a barrier to seeking 

help besides being viewed as a source of distress. Restrictions on mobility are also perceived 

as an obstacle by students, considering the limited access and social interaction with peers or 

those closest to them. 

Credible COVID-19 information plays a role in reducing the crisis impact. Accurate 

information has a beneficial effect on avoiding transmission and mitigating the virus spread 

(Patwary et al., 2021). Conversely, fake news and rumors can have negative impacts, such as 



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anti-vaccine provocations and patient or health worker rejection, causing fear, terror, stress, 

and mental health problems (Abdullah, 2020). COVID-19 misinformation reports have 

become an unstoppable snowball news in comments and posts on social media or in sharing 

and forwarding online news. The reporting of increasing COVID-19 cases has driven social 

uncertainty and helplessness. These aspects have relevance to mental health issues. 

Longitudinal studies have found that media exposure related to the 9/11 attacks correlates 

with the emergence of re-trauma about the horror event (Silver et al., 2013). Although the 

9/11 incident is clearly different from the global pandemic crisis, it drives the idea that media 

information and social media opinion can harm mental health. A literature review has 

identified that widespread pandemic information negatively affects the mental health of 

adults, the elderly, and women (Delgado et al., 2021); it confirms that young adults are a 

group that is vulnerable to infodemic influences. 

The change in learning from face-to-face to online changes student activities 

drastically, especially without any mitigation efforts against it. Assignments are perceived to 

be given in an even more enormous amount with little to no support from teachers (Chaturvedi 

et al., 2021). Participants perceived the assignments as academic stress. Students with 

adaptive pandemic strategies have healthier behaviors and can find sources of assistance and 

academic achievement (Babicka-Wirkus et al., 2021). Parallel to previous findings, people 

who tend to lack disclosure have difficulty in managing their mental health, as they cannot 

find any appropriate person to trust and rely on. Keeping problems from others is preferred 

by people who have trust issues and disappointment with trust, and the problem is taboo and 

too humiliating for others to know (Seamark & Gabriel, 2018). They rely more on themselves, 

and telling problems to others is believed to not solve problems. Furthermore, the lack of 

access to mental health care has increased reluctance to access available assistance. Despite 

telemental health efforts that have been attempted (Ramalho et al., 2020), various service 

limitations during the isolation period related to the shortcomings in national strategies and 

regulations still need to be more helpful. 

The COVID-19 pandemic is a crisis that may take another form. However, problems 

regarding the causes and forms of student psychological problems have occurred even outside 

of the pandemic. The pandemic crisis has worsened mental health problems. The awareness 

to care for each other needs to be strengthened in hopes of averting young people from being 

dragged into deeper psychological problems. It is worth noting that loneliness can reduce 

psychological well-being, even with lower distress (Nurdiyanto et al., 2022). 

There are some limitations of this study. First, this study is limited in exploring what 

students perceived as barriers to handling mental health and did not limit the scope of such 

obstacles in a specific condition. Future research has opportunities to apply studies to limited 

barriers, for example, depression or marginalized issues. Secondly, data collection was 

conducted in a brief qualitative survey, and we did not collect data in the traditional qualitative 

framework by observation and interviews. Thus, we do not have intimate interactions with 

our participants. Data was collected through online social media, where women were 

dominant among our respondents. Further research needs to involve a more balanced gender 

participant.  

Conclusion 

This study described the pandemic's consequences on students' barriers to managing mental 

health during a pandemic to contribute to a discussion on adolescents' mental health, the 

significance of pandemic disruption, and how the barriers they perceive. During the COVID-

19 pandemic, students encountered obstacles in managing mental health related to the lack of 



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social support, mobility restrictions, pandemic information overload, and the lack of self-

disclosure regarding personal issues. Social interaction is proven crucial in supporting or 

hindering students in managing mental health. In addition, information overload can hinder 

students from addressing mental health as well as the tendency to neglect healthy living 

behaviors. Mental health promotion must integrate information on accessing mental health 

assistance (e.g., formal, semi-formal, and informal) and adopt adaptive coping strategies in 

crises. It is critical for higher education institutions to provide mental health services that are 

more accessible to all students. 

Acknowledgment 

This article was presented in the National Seminar at Universitas Ahmad Dahlan on 18 June 

2022. We thank our research assistants: Ignatius Yudhistira, Elsa Yolen, and Gitareja Maega.  

Declarations  

Author contribution. FAN developed the research design and initial draft. FAN, IMPG, and 

EPH conducted data collection and analysis. All authors contributed and accepted the 

manuscript's final version. 

Funding statement. None 

Conflict of interest. The authors declare no conflict of interest. 
Additional information. No additional information is available for this paper. 
 

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