Optimization of Ideological and Political Education Courses for College Students and Strategies for Mental Health Education

Introduction

The university stage is the transition stage for college students to enter society. It is also an important stage and process for students’ mental health and maturity. In this stage, psychological health education is carried out for college students through multiple channels. The combination of college students’ psychological quality and students’ ideological education and teaching can better realize the comprehensive cultivation of students and improve their ideological and moral quality.¹

The rapid development of network technology has made the network an indispensable part of college students’ daily life. Proper terms such as phubbing, mobile phone control, Weibo control, and Taobao control have replaced the common meaning of learning, sports, and entertainment. Additionally, college students are at the end of adolescence and early adulthood, which is an important stage for forming individual socialization, values, social cognition, and other psychological ideas. The source of novelty and the medium of mass information storage, the network, began to significantly impact the psychological health of college students.²

Based on the highly open social environment and gradually diversified outlook on life and values, contemporary college students can adapt to the fast-paced and highly competitive social life only if they have good psychological quality and ideological and political education (IPE). Based on healthy psychological qualities, college students’ morality, intelligence, physique, and beauty can be fully developed, and they can better cultivate their practical ability and innovative spirit. Additionally, mental health education is a comprehensive implementation of the party’s educational policy in colleges and universities. Humanistic care and IPE are effective guarantees to promote contemporary college students’ comprehensive and healthy development.³

The existing research pays great attention to the ideological health education of college students, focusing on improving students’ mental health education in the IPE, but ignores the analysis of factors affecting students’ mental health.⁴ The network environment’s complexity is one reason for the negative impact on college students’ psychology. Detailed discussion and research are carried out. These studies fill the gaps in the existing literature. Additionally, this paper expounds on the importance, mechanism, and approach of combining IPE and mental health education in colleges and universities, which has certain theoretical significance for educational circles.

This work will combine domestic and foreign scholars’ research results to link college students’ impact on the network environment information and the connection between IPE and psychological health. Then, the effect of network information dissemination on the psychology of college students when faced with emergencies is discussed. The randomized survey method, chi-square test, and multivariate logistic analysis are used for testing. The influence of college students’ information media contact behavior on their psychology in the network environment is explored. The influence of the popular network environment on society is gradually deepening. Therefore, this work aims to summarize the problems that arise online by analyzing college students’ ideological education and psychological health. In addition, it will help the government, society, schools, and families to intervene to facilitate the healthy growth of college students’ minds and bodies. Meanwhile, the popular network environment will exert an essential guiding and boosting effect on college students’ ideological and political construction and psychological health.

Literature Review

The dissemination of information on the internet affects college students’ risk perception, affecting their behavior and psychology and influencing current policies.⁵ Zarocostas pointed out that misinformation on social media was highly harmful in “How to fight an Infodemic.” It could even accelerate dissemination by affecting social responses.⁶ In investigating the direction of information rumors on the internet, Chen pointed out in his published article that WeChat and Weibo became the origin of the outbreak of information through the tracking of samples, accounting for 60.7% and 27.0% of all rumor samples, respectively.⁷ Therefore, the spread of information on online platforms has the characteristics of “strong ties” acquaintances and “weak ties.” For this critical period, college students’ ideological, political, and psychological health education is necessary.

Scholar Yang analyzed the main factors affecting effectiveness regarding the educational content, carrier, subject, and object in a questionnaire survey of the efficacy of network IPE.⁸ Luo pointed out that there were many main problems with the timeliness of online IPE in colleges and universities. Besides, the overall quality of the teaching team needed to be improved. The work management mechanism was not perfect. Education platforms were relatively backward. The educational environment was not optimistic.⁹ Scholar Chen analyzed the actual situation and deficiencies of network IPE. An example was five representative undergraduate schools in Fujian Province. The effectiveness was tested, and instructive suggestions and strategies were given through systematic analysis.¹⁰ In addition, the openness, convenience, secrecy, and richness of the internet have various reasons for the psychological tendency of college students. Without social support, college students can choose the internet to release anxiety, stress, and conflict. The results of Liu et al’s research showed that students who used the internet had higher physical, psychological, and social scores than students who did not normally use the internet. For example, the scores of internet addiction and its prone students were negatively correlated with their quality of life. The scores of neuroticism and psychoticism were relatively high, and the concealment scores were the opposite.¹¹ According to Eysenck’s personality theory, people with high scores on neuroticism are more likely to show symptoms such as anxiety and sullenness. Those with high scores on the dimension of mentality are prone to be withdrawn, indifferent to people and things, unfriendly, and have a low emotional experience. They tend to find themselves in an illusory world.¹²

However, previous research experience is no longer suitable for studying the impact of emergency information dissemination on public psychology in the background of online media. This work combines IPE with social psychology. It innovatively links the psychological health status of college students with the spread of information on social media in terms of research content. The impact of college students’ contact habits of information on their psychology is studied by taking ideological and political courses as the starting point. It is found that the psychological health status of college students is inextricably linked to the distribution of information.

Materials and Methods

College Students’ Network Psychology

The core goal of college students’ network IPE is to improve the network ideological and political quality of college students to help college students adapt to the network society and ultimately achieve the overall development of individuals. From the analysis of the source of psychological needs of behavior, first, in terms of physiological needs, college students’ online behavior needs to meet their physiological needs so that their instincts can be satisfied. Second, the online behavior of college students should also meet the requirements for self-growth. They supplement and improve their developmental shortcomings and make their development more perfect by gaining experience and knowledge. Third, the online behavior of college students is also an important part of their moral practice, satisfying the moral development of college students, constructing a system of personal moral rules, realizing their spiritual sublimation, and reaching the “superego”.¹³

Nowadays, most college students can use the internet reasonably, but there are also many problems, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 Factors for some college students to use the internet unreasonably.

From Figure 1, college student internet use mainly focuses on self-growth needs and leisure and entertainment. They do not fully understand and utilize the social function of the network and the function of self-development. Whether positive or negative reinforcement will affect students’ behaviors and increase the frequency of a behavior. The continuous dissemination and diffusion of this negative information will inevitably impact college students’ cognitive ability and behavior, resulting in cognitive and behavioral deviations.

IPE Work and Network Environment

The influence of the network environment on the IPE of college students can be divided into positive and negative parts. On the one hand, the rich content and different expressions in the network environment promote the development of college students’ IPE and promote the effectiveness of college students’ network IPE. On the other hand, the management of some aspects of the network environment is insufficient, and there are certain irregularities. It makes college students’ minds easily polluted by incomplete network information and harms the development of their values, world outlook, and outlook on life.¹⁴ Figure 2 shows its negative impact and positive impact.

Figure 2 The influence of popular internet culture on the ideological and political education of college students.

Scholar Zhang defined the ideological and political work on campus networks. He suggested that the ideological and political work of the campus network was to carry out the ideological and political work for the students through the campus network. Additionally, the definition of this concept became an enrichment and expansion of the definition of IPE for college students.¹⁵ College students continue to learn in an online environment. The network’s IPE can be delineated under the campus network system and carry out multimedia teaching. Nowadays, the IPE of college students should also be improved continuously following the progress over time. Educational methods should be innovative. Educational content should be rich. The educational carrier must also be continuously expanded to improve the educational environment so college students can carry out ideological and political learning. The entire development state should be diverse, three-dimensional, interactive, open, and subjective.¹⁶

Popular Environment

There is no strict definition of the online environment. It can be considered a popular web-based environment. The popular network environment is usually regarded as the common subordinate concept of the popular environment and the network culture and has both characteristics.¹⁷ As a cultural form in the new era, network culture is the product of network globalization and the crystallization of the trend of human development. Network culture spreads the spiritual reflection of human beings through network time and space and network field and conveys human’s daily life, work, study, and thinking process. Moreover, it transforms this spiritual reflection into machine language through computer technology, transmitted to all parts of the world by network media.¹⁸ A popular environment is a culture characterized by fashion and fashion, with entertainment as its function and widely disseminated through mass media. It has a certain independent status, reflecting the market spirit of the network society, the democratic spirit of the common people, and the aesthetic spirit of popular ideals. It also can influence mainstream culture. In the past, there was a certain antagonism between the popular environment and the elite culture. However, in the modern age where knowledge is increasingly popularized, the group represented by college students becomes the main audience and influences the popular environment. The popular environment and elite culture also merge.¹⁹ The popular environment represents the mind and spirit of specific classes and groups of society. Network culture is generally considered a new culture based on internet technology and mediated by digital carriers. Audiences are group and engaging. Content is popular and infectious. The medium is swift and interactive.²⁰

SPSS Survey Reliability Test

This paper uses the sampling method to conduct a questionnaire survey on some college students. The data are collected in the form of paper and online questionnaires. The collected data is statistically analyzed using Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS) software.²¹ The percentage of data statistics is used to analyze the current situation of college students’ network use and information contact. According to the statistical data, Logistic analyzes the correlation between variables. The students’ psychological conditions are interpreted combined with the college students’ psychological and emotional analysis table Before the survey, the reliability of the questionnaire is tested to determine that its design is suitable for this survey.

The reliability test refers to the consistency of the results obtained when the same method is used to repeat the measurement on the same object, that is, the degree to which the test survey reflects the actual situation.²² The reliability of the survey results is an important indicator for evaluating the reliability of the questionnaire. The reliability case analysis process is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3 SPSS collation reliability analysis process diagram.

The Correlation Coefficient (CC) is an indicator of reliability. CC can be roughly divided into three categories: stability, equivalent, and internal consistency. These three types of CC detect data consistency across time, across modalities, and across items, respectively. There are four main reliability analysis methods, as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4 Reliability analysis classification.

Cronbach α Coefficient of Reliability (COR)

The Cronbach α COR method evaluates the consistency between the scores of each variable in the scale, which belongs to the internal consistency coefficient and is suitable for the reliability analysis of attitude and opinion scales.²³ Cronbach α can be calculated according to Equation 1.

(1)

In Equation 1, k is the total number of items in the scale, is the within-item variance of the score of the first item, and is the variance of the total score of all items. From Equation 1, the number of measurement items will affect Cronbach’s α COR. The larger the number of analysis items, the higher the Cronbach’s α COR may be. The number of measurement items is at least two, and the COR may be the lowest.

Half Factor

The splitting factor involves the Spearman-Brown coefficient and the Guttman Split-Half coefficient. The Spearman-Brown coefficients are divided into two types of calculations of equal and unequal length.²⁴ They are explained as follows.

(2)

If it is equal length, the calculation method of equal length Spearman-Brown coefficient is as above. In Equation 2, R represents the CC value of the data split into two parts. First, the data is divided into two parts. Then, they are summed separately to get two columns of data. If it is not equal, the number of analysis items split into two parts is inconsistent (odd-numbered items). The unequal length Spearman-Brown coefficient is obtained at this time according to Equation 3.

(3)

In Equation 3, R is the CC of the two parts of the data. and respectively represent the number of analysis items of the two parts of the data, .

Results

The Current Situation of College Students’ Network Information Use

As of June 2017, Chinese internet users reached 732 million. The penetration rate reached 54.8%, 3.1 percentage points higher than the global average (51.7%) and 8.1 percentage points higher than the Asian average (46.7%). The proportion of Chinese college students accessing the internet exceeded 90%, and those who surf the internet were close to 50%. As a result, the internet has progressively penetrated people’s lives, from worthiness to behavioral styles, from moral thinking to spiritual evolution. This also has a massive impact on the everyday life of college students. According to the China internet Network Information Center report, age distribution and literacy of Chinese internet users are revealed in Figures 5 and 6.

Figure 5 Internet usage ratio by age group.

Figure 6 The ratio of internet usage by educational level.

From Figure 6, internet users have the highest percentage between 18 and 29. The proportion of internet users with a college degree or above is the largest, accounting for 47.1%. It also shows that most users of China’s internet are college students. College students are the age of elites. They are at the leading edge of internet usage and bear a greater social responsibility than others. However, many students just use the internet as a tool for chatting instead of using the internet to collect information and find information. Moreover, some are addicted to online gambling, and some even skip classes, making some college students’ grades worse daily. College students fail many courses, so they are repeated or dismissed. Therefore, on the one hand, college students expand their horizons through the internet, learn well, and make life colorful. On the other hand, the internet also negatively influences college students. They need positive guidance. Therefore, it is essential to implement the IPE of college students in the network environment. Ideological and political workers in colleges and universities should take the initiative to occupy the high ground of online IPE.

Analysis of College Students’ Internet Information Contact Behavior

A total of 500 college students are randomly surveyed. The gender distribution is as follows. There are 230 boys, accounting for 46% of the total surveyed. There are 270 female students, accounting for 54% of the total number of respondents. The number of samples aged 15–20 is 209, accounting for 41.8% of the total sample. The number of samples from 21 to 25 years old is 182, accounting for 36.4% of the total sample books. The sample size of 26–30-year-olds is 30, accounting for 6% of the total sample size. The number of samples over the age of 31 is 12, accounting for 2.4% of the total sample size. The grade distribution is as follows. The sample size of first-year students is 122, accounting for 24.4% of the total sample size. The sample size of sophomore students is 170, accounting for 34% of the total sample size. The sample size of junior students is 138, accounting for 27.6% of the total sample size. The sample size of the senior year is 70, accounting for 14% of the total sample size.

The investigation of the relevant information is shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7 College students’ attention to online information.

Among the data with a total sample size of 500 people, 372 people actively search for information through social media, accounting for 74.4% of the total sample size. College students are motivated to obtain information through social media.

College students have different habits of querying information through the internet in different periods, as demonstrated in Figure 8.

Figure 8 The amount of college students’ attention to online information in different periods.

In Figure 8, the number of college students who come into contact with information through social media from 00:00 to 6:00 accounts for 9.0% of the total sample size. The number of people who contact information through social media from 6:00 to 12:00 accounts for 48% of the total number of samples. The number of people who get information through social media from 12:00 to 18:00 accounts for 19% of the total sample size. The number of people who contact information through social media from 18:00 to 24:00 accounts for 24% of the total number of samples.

Figure 9 shows the time college students pay attention to the information daily.

Figure 9 College students’ daily internet information time.

From Figure 9, the number of students who spend less than one hour a day contacting information through online media accounts for 15% of the total sample size. The number of college students who spend 1 to 3 hours a day getting information through social media accounts for 11% of the total sample size. The number of college students who spend 3 to 6 hours a day contacting information through social media accounts for 52% of the total sample size. The number of college students who spend more than 6 hours a day contacting information through social media accounts for 22% of the total sample size.

Subjective credibility surveys were conducted on the information released by the online platform. Figure 10 reveals the results.

Figure 10 College students’ reliability of internet information.

From Figure 10, college students generally believe that information on social media platforms is highly credible. Among the surveyed college students, 445 believe that the information published on social media is always believable, accounting for 89% of the total sample. One hundred ten people fully agree with this view, and 280 agree, accounting for 22% and 56% of the total sample.

Analysis of the Psychological Status of College Students

Here, the psychological status is mainly analyzed from the degree of depression and anxiety of college students. Depression is divided into five standards: normal, minor depression, moderate depression, major depression, and very serious depression. It has been found that the depression of college students is not optimistic. After statistical calculation, the depression situation is shown in Figure 11.

Figure 11 Number of people with different degrees of depression.

In Figure 11, 92% of the surveyed college students have depression on a test. The presence of minor depression accounts for 67% of the total sample size. Moderate depression accounts for 14.6% of the total sample size. The major depressive mood accounts for 4.4% of the total sample size. The number of very serious cases is 30, accounting for 6%. It is found that the survey respondents are in a relatively severe state of depression as a whole.

The anxiety level is divided into five standards: normal, mild anxiety, moderate anxiety, severe anxiety, and very serious. The conditions are shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12 Number of people with different levels of anxiety.

From Figure 12, 96% of the total number of students who have anxiety in the anxiety test surveyed college students. The presence of mild anxiety accounts for 63% of the total sample size. The presence of moderate anxiety accounts for 18.6% of the total sample size. Severe anxiety accounts for 6.4% of the total sample size. The number of very serious cases is 41, accounting for 8.2%. College students are generally anxious, and the situation is serious. Then, a multi-factor analysis is carried out on the negative impact of college students’ psychology. The numbers zero, one, two, three, and four represent the degree of the factor. The larger the value, the more obvious the meaning of the factor. Table 1 shows the condition.

Table 1 Psychological and Emotional Analysis Table of College Students

Among the 500 college students sampled in the survey, more than 90% have varying degrees of depression and anxiety. Psychological training and IPE are necessary for college students. Depression and anxiety states tend to increase linearly over time. This is closely related to disseminating information in the network media and constructing ideological and political disciplines in major universities. Therefore, the optimization of IPE courses and the psychological training of college students is urgent.

Discussion

College students’ IPE goals, educational content, psychological training goals, and training methods must be constantly updated and improved. Given the emerging educational conditions, college students’ thoughts and psychology should be adjusted accordingly to adapt to the development of society and the times to meet the needs of the new era. Based on the characteristics of the network environment, Han analyzed the new requirements of college students’ mental health education and raised the existing difficulties. These difficulties include college students themselves and educators. It analyzes the mental health problems college students face in the network environment and explores the methods and approaches to mental health.²⁵ Son analyzed the network’s positive and negative effects on college students’ mental health and pointed out educational countermeasures. The characteristics of the network, such as full-time, openness, virtuality, equality, anonymity, and multimedia, make it deeply affect and change the lives of college students. Additionally, it affects the mental health of college students.²⁶

The contact behavior of information can affect the psychology of college students, but this is only a part of the influencing factors. The investigation should be combined with the individual factors of college students, social and environmental factors, schools, and society. In the critical period of college students’ growth, the research on mental health, ideology, and politics should go further. Therefore, schools and society can make the above points or take more measures to guide college students to use network media rationally and cultivate good psychological quality, which is significant to preventing college students from having mental diseases.

Conclusions

With changes in the international situation, it is imperative to strengthen college students’ IPE and mental health education. Therefore, this work uses bibliometrics and random sampling survey methods to understand the application of network information faced by college students and the psychological impact on college students. Then, it expounds on the importance of IPE to contemporary college students. The depression and anxiety of college students are analyzed, and the problems in the psychological training of college students are studied. The obstacles existing in ideological, political, and psychological training are analyzed through the network traffic environment and the influence of bad media information on college students’ IPE. The survey results are used to analyze the survey results using the multi-factor analysis method, Cronbach α COR method, chi-square test, and other methods. The statistical results conclude that more than one-third of college students currently have varying degrees of anxiety and depression. Improving innovative work in IPE and psychological training is crucial. The limitation is that the period of the subject in this context is long. It is impossible to examine the impact of college students’ exposure to online media information on ideological and political courses and psychological health horizontally according to the time dimension of the development and change. The background of the investigators is unknown. These problems will be gradually improved and strengthened in the follow-up work to explore the impact of the internet on college students’ mental health.