The Impact of Financial, Familial, Social Factors on Mental Health Among University Students in Malaysia
- DOI
- 10.2991/978-94-6239-709-5_123How to use a DOI?
- Keywords
- Mental illness; University students; Financial Distress; Family factors; Social relationships
- Abstract
This study examines how financial distress, family factors, and social relationships shape mental illness among students in Malaysian private universities, using a cognitive-behavioural lens. A quantitative cross-sectional survey was administered online to university students, using a structured questionnaire with validated Likert-scale items adapted from prior studies. Reliability tests indicated satisfactory internal consistency across constructs. Correlation analysis showed strong positive associations between the predictors and mental ill- ness, with financial distress exhibiting the highest correlation (r = 0.873, p < 0.001), followed by family factors (r = 0.848, p < 0.001) and social relation- ships (r = 0.830, p < 0.001). Regression results further indicated that financial distress accounted for the largest share of explained variance in mental illness (R2 = 0.763), while family factors (R2 = 0.689) and social relationships (R2 = 0.668) also contributed substantially. The findings suggest that financial strain is the most influential factor in this context, while family support and social connectedness remain important correlates of student mental health. Practically, the results support targeted interventions that prioritise financial counselling and support services, strengthen family-based and institutional support systems, and enhance peer connectedness, alongside cognitive-behavioural strategies that address maladaptive appraisals and coping responses.
- Copyright
- © 2026 The Author(s)
- Open Access
- Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.
Cite this article
TY - CONF AU - Siti Zakiah Syed Mustafa AU - Ruvindran David AU - Wan Nur Tasnim Wan Hussin AU - Hairin Nisa Meor Nordin AU - Siti Asmahan Mohd Ali AU - Anis Shafiqah Mohd Saidun PY - 2026 DA - 2026/06/20 TI - The Impact of Financial, Familial, Social Factors on Mental Health Among University Students in Malaysia BT - Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Accounting, Management, and Economics (10th ICAME 2025) PB - Atlantis Press SP - 1759 EP - 1769 SN - 2352-5428 UR - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-709-5_123 DO - 10.2991/978-94-6239-709-5_123 ID - Mustafa2026 ER -