A semi-structured interview was designed to assess the mental health status of college students, aimed to explore the ways that students have been coping with stress related to the pandemic.

• The first part of the survey included the Perceived Stress Scale-10 (PSS), used to measure stress felt over the course of the last month.
• Participants were asked of they felt their own stress levels changed because of the pandemic, as well as their opinions of the stress levels of their peers.
• Researchers then elicited pandemic-specific stressors and their manifestations across 10 categories of outcomes, including academic, health, and lifestyle.

195 undergraduate students (111 = female, 84 = male) were recruited for the study, with an average age of 20.7 years.

• The participants were recruited from a large public university in Texas, US, which closed its campuses on March 23rd, 2020.
• Most interviews were conducted via Zoom, a month after the stay-at-home order was issued in Texas.