"Let’s assume that college students are in debt more. First of all, there’s probably a good reason for this. One is that the benefits of going to college and, if you have to, going into debt to go to college, have actually been much greater than in the past. In other words, if you looked at the benefits in terms of your pay down the road to a person getting a college degree, compare those to the cost of going into debt, it still works out where the benefits are much greater than the costs," says Dr. Walden, an economist with the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

"Secondly there is some evidence suggesting that if some college students go into debt significantly, they are actually doing it at the end of their college career, when they either know or have a good idea of what kind of job and what kind of pay that job will carry," he adds. "So it’s sort of like they are prebuying a lot of things -- knowing that, yes, they can afford that once they get a job."