By Mia Hanuska
There’s always more to do. There’s always more that can be done: more to see, more to learn. This is the mindset of many high school students, trying to get the most activities and advanced classes possible; trying to make their college applications the most favorable. And this is what’s pushed on most students—how many clubs are you in? What service hours did you complete? You could use more AP classes. It’s a never-ending cycle of trying to find the most advanced and impressive thing to put on applications, to brag about to peers, to report on résumés. With summer approaching, the most important thing for students to remember is to simply take a break.
Students experience extreme stress from school activities—in fact, 15% of Swedish students in one study report severe anxiety to the point of chronic anxiety. The pressure of school performance and demanding work as main stressors can cause greater feelings of overwhelm and worry, with 60% of Swedish students feeling stressed over school-related tasks. “Achievement was the student characteristic most consistently associated with responses to chronic stress,” reports a study focusing on the stress of college applications on students. Chronic stress even affects school performance—chronically stressed students often show significantly worse grades at the end of the school year than their non stressed peers. Moreover, the adolescent brain is susceptible to the effects of chronic stress due to the continued development of certain parts of the brain, such as the amygdala. When exposed to stress, the amygdala, responsible for processing emotions and making decisions, experiences morphological and structural changes that can impact its function. Similarly, the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, both sections of the brain that play a significant role in determining if a situation is stressful, also experience changes due to stress hormones, resulting in the inhibition of their ability to properly evaluate circumstances. Thus, since the brain continues developing during adolescence, extreme stress may have damaging effects on the growing brain.
Moreover, sleep quality also suffers from adolescent chronic stress. Especially during exam weeks, sleep efficiency and quality diminishes significantly when compared to summer (normal) sleep patterns. During the holidays, students’ sleep time decreases from about “7:38 h ± 12 min during holidays to 6:40 h ± 12 min during a regular school week,” and can lower to nearly 6:23 h ± 8 min during testing weeks. Insufficient sleep can degrade high-level cognitive abilities and especially impacts creative thinking. In the end, the effects of chronic stress on the brain and body simply snowballs, causing more and more issues. Fortunately, with the upcoming summer break, students may have the opportunity to slow down, and begin to cleanse themselves of the stress inflicted by school. In fact, students should prioritize taking a break and allowing their bodies to rest over continuing classes or school during the summer. With the rise in summer course enrollments, teenagers may fear the effect of slowing down on their academic performance; however, one’s health must come before academics. Participating in a non-academic summer program (such as summer camps) even shows trends towards improvement on mental health, self perception, and social-emotional well-being, further exacerbating the importance of focusing on enjoyable activities during summer. So this summer, don’t feel guilty for being “lazy”—your body likely needs the rest.