Lower-Income Students More Stressed Over College Admissions
Credit: Hiraman / E+ / Getty Images- A new report sheds light on the stress and anxiety students feel about college admissions.
- Students from less financially advantaged backgrounds are more likely to feel stress than those from higher-income families.
- Factors such as academic flexibility, a supportive environment, and proximity to home rank high for many students.
- Middle-income and underrepresented students seek institutions that promote positive mental and emotional well-being.
Just in time for National Mental Health Awareness Month comes a new survey shedding light on the stress and anxiety college applicants experience.
Conducted by the higher education consulting firm Art & Science Group, the survey polled more than 600 high school seniors heading to a four-year college in fall 2025. A slight majority (54%) were white, and 65% identified as female.
The key finding in the report — titled “Who’s Feelin’ It? The Real Faces of College Admissions Anxiety” — counters the prevailing narrative that well-heeled, high-achieving students clamoring for spots in the Ivy League experience the most stress. Instead, the authors point out, it’s students from lower-income backgrounds who shoulder more angst.
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Across the board, 89% of students reported experiencing moderate to high levels of anxiety during the college search and application process, while 43% said they had high anxiety.
But 62% of students from lower-income families — classified here as those earning less than $60,000 annually — reported having high levels of stress.
“Reading the press, you’d think that anxiety about college search, admission, and selection would be at its peak among high-performing students from high-income families in ambitious communities feeling severe pressure from parental and peer expectations,” the authors note.
Instead, anxiety levels are “actually lowest in such populations,” they claim, and “highest among those less well-positioned to succeed in the college search and application sweepstakes.”
That includes students with lower levels of “educational socialization” — namely, first-generation students.
In fact, students in the lowest income levels reported having the highest anxiety levels (7.6 on a 10-point scale), with middle-income students citing the next highest (6.5). Among students in the highest income brackets, that figure was 4.7.
Yet all students share common sentiments when it comes to the sources of consternation. It seems the more involved students become in the application process, the more anxious they feel.
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As deadlines approach, writing essays and the feeling of “competing with other applicants” cause stress levels to spike, prompting many students to seek colleges that don’t require essays, interviews, and standardized test scores.
Pressure from family and friends along the way, however, doesn’t factor much for students regardless of their economic situation.
The survey also explores what students look for in a college that might help alleviate stress. Only one pertains to the admissions process: high acceptance rates. Other considerations include flexible academic programs, a supportive community, and proximity to home.
Many students also seek institutions that promote “positive mental and emotional well-being.” Here again, differences exist based on students’ level of “social and educational capital.”
A college’s stated commitment to mental health was more of a key factor for first-generation, Black, rural, and middle-income students.
The report doesn’t outline concrete ways colleges can reduce the stress students feel during the search and application process, though it does suggest that touting a supportive environment focused on positive mental health might help attract students who need that kind of reassurance.
And many of those students are the ones most at risk for not attending in the first place.