TUESDAY, Oct. 6, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Do you tend to have a packed schedule, darting from one appointment to the next?
That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, depending on how you feel about being busy, a new study says.
College students with the busiest schedules were significantly less likely to be depressed and tended to get better grades as well, researchers reported recently in the Journal of American College Health.
However, students had higher rates of anxiety and depression if they felt a chronic sense of rush or time pressure, no matter what their schedules looked like, researchers found.
Students with higher levels of mindfulness — the ability to be present and aware in the moment — appeared better able to handle busy schedules without harming their mental health, the team added.
“We have a tendency to think, ‘Oh, things will get better, and I won’t be stressed if I can just take some things off of my plate,’ ” lead researcher Caitlin McKimmy, a doctoral candidate in psychology and neuroscience at the University of Colorado at Boulder, said in a news release. “These data show that it’s not that simple.”
For the study, researchers focused on two distinct elements of the human perception of time: “Time pressure," the feeling of being rushed, and “time scarcity,” the feeling that there aren’t enough hours in the day.
McKimmy — herself a busy mom of two — surveyed 646 college students about their schedules, including class time, homework, outside jobs, commuting and other activities.
The survey also asked students about the time pressure they felt, how anxious or depressed they were and their level of mindfulness.
Time scarcity was strongly associated with both better grades and lower rates of depression, results showed.
However, higher levels of time pressure were strongly associated with more anxiety and depression, as well as lower grades, researchers said.
Interestingly, being short on time did not automatically cause a sense of time pressure, the team found.
“You can have a very busy person who has a harmonious relationship with time and someone else who, objectively speaking, has a calendar with some space in it but is really stressed out about time,” McKimmy said.
McKimmy noted that this doesn’t mean that staying busy sparks happiness.
It could be that people with better mental health are able to take on more, while those struggling with anxiety or depression hit their limit earlier, researchers said.
There also could be other underlying factors influencing both mental health and how a person perceives time, the team added.
For example, depression itself can influence a person’s perception of time, potentially making their schedules feel unmanageable, earlier research has shown.
But the results do indicate that cutting back on activities won’t automatically relieve stress, McKimmy said.
“These data support the idea that doing more and being engaged can not only lead to better mental health but could also support academic and professional success,” she said.
For instance, a well-adjusted student could take on a part-time job without hurting their GPA if it doesn’t add to their sense of time pressure, the results indicate.
Likewise, a person who retreats socially when their grades or work performance slip might wind up with a monotonous schedule and a growing sense of loneliness, McKimmy said.
Mindfulness appears to be a key protective factor. People who remained in the moment became less depressed or anxious when stressed about their schedule, researchers found.
“There appears to be something about attuning to the present moment that protects you against the negative impact of time pressure,” McKimmy said.
People feeling stressed about their schedule should fill their time with things that align with their passions and values and try to stay present, McKimmy advised. When feeling stressed, take a moment to focus on your breath and ground yourself in your body and in the moment.
“The amount of time we have in our week isn’t super malleable,” she said. “But the way we think about time is.”
More information
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about stress management.
SOURCE: University of Colorado at Boulder, news release, Sept. 30, 2026
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