College students feel more pressure to be perfect. Experts explain why

As they navigate their newfound freedom, today's college students might be forming an unexpected and potentially unhealthy habit: perfectionism.

Researchers in Canada and the U.K. recently analyzed rates of self-reported perfectionism from 82,939 American, Canadian and British college students between 1989 and 2024. They found that rates of both perfectionistic concerns, such as fear of failure and being negatively judged by others, and perfectionistic strivings, the motivation to set standards and toil to achieve them, have risen.

Both types of perfectionism have been associated with anxiety and depression, among other mental health challenges, according to the report.

Other studies have already found high rates of both among students. Around two-thirds of college students reported managing anxiety or stress in 2025, for example, according to a 2026 survey by United Health Group. Forty four percent said they also managed depression.

"Young people no longer experience success as simply something they hope to achieve," says Jennifer Wallace, author of the bestselling book "Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—And What We Can Do About It."

"Too often," she says, "they experience it as proof that they are worthy."

Here's why experts think college students are becoming more perfectionistic, and what young people can do to manage perfectionistic pressure.

Big picture, "there isn't one culprit" for the rise in perfectionism, says Wallace.

Researchers found associations between slowing GDP per capita and rising perfectionistic strivings, for example. They also found associations between rising inequality and rates of perfectionistic concerns. The suggestion is that as the economy slows, young people feel both that they need to work harder to move the needle for themselves financially, and that more is riding on every misstep, researchers found.

As of the last decade, Katherine Morgan Schafler, psychotherapist and author of "The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control: A Path to Peace and Power," would add social media and constant access to people's seemingly manicured lives to the mix of influences. Opportunities to feel like you're "failing" are "presented to you more frequently," she says.

Ultimately, the driving forces are "the convergence of rising economic inequality, uncertainty about the future, intensely competitive schools and workplaces, constant social comparison, and increasingly anxious parenting," says Wallace.

All of it makes young people feel like one mistake could cost them their future, she says.

In a moment of stress, Schafler would also encourage students to ask themselves a grounding question: What's the common humanity here? Have other people gone through similar experiences?

"It's a question that's simply supposed to remind you that you are not alone in the experience that you're having," she says. "That it is, in fact, quite common, and people are having it right now, and not like five people, like, millions of people."

CNBC Select is editorially independent and may earn a commission from affiliate partners on links.