COVID-19 Stressful Life Events and Chinese Adolescents' Mental Health: Examining Resilience, Peer Relationship, and Parenting as Moderators

The current study examines intrapersonal characteristics or factors (i.e., resilience), peer (i.e., quality of peer relationships), and family processes (i.e., parental involvement, critical comparison) as potential risk and protective factors for mental health of Chinese adolescents during COVID- 19 pandemic. A total of 504 seventh-grade students (52% boys) and their caregivers in Beijing, China completed an online survey in September 2020. Youth reported experiencing various COVID-19-related stressful life events (i.e., conflicts with parents, poor learning environment and efficiency, family financial pressure), and about 15% reported slightly elevated scores of mental health difficulties. Findings suggested personal resilience and quality of peer relationship predicted positive mental health (i.e., covitality or co-occurrence of positive psychological dispositions) and less mental health difficulties. Parent's critical comparison intensified the negative link between stressful life events and youth mental health. Implications for promoting youth mental health as schools reopen are discussed.

COVID-19 Stressful Life Events and Chinese Adolescents’ Mental Health: Examining Resilience, Peer Relationship, and Parenting as Moderators

The current study examines intrapersonal characteristics or factors (i.e., resilience), peer (i.e., quality of peer relationships), and family processes (i.e., parental involvement, critical comparison) as potential risk and protective factors for mental health of Chinese adolescents during COVID- 19 pandemic. A total of 504 seventh-grade students (52% boys) and their caregivers in Beijing, China completed an online survey in September 2020. Youth reported experiencing various COVID-19-related stressful life events (i.e., conflicts with parents, poor learning environment and efficiency, family financial pressure), and about 15% reported slightly elevated scores of mental health difficulties. Findings suggested personal resilience and quality of peer relationship predicted positive mental health (i.e., covitality or co-occurrence of positive psychological dispositions) and less mental health difficulties. Parent’s critical comparison intensified the negative link between stressful life events and youth mental health. Implications for promoting youth mental health as schools reopen are discussed.

Need for cognitive closure and trust towards government predicting pandemic behavior and mental health: comparing United States and China.

Residents of the United States and China have responded very differently to the implementation of COVID-19 preventive measures. This study introduces the uncertainty reduction theory and the need for cognitive closure (NFC) framework into the context of a public health crisis and compares models across the United States and China. Specifically, we collected survey data to examine how NFC, trust in government, and attitudes toward preventive measures predicted pandemic compliance behaviors, depressive symptoms, and life satisfaction among 745 college students (399 from China and 346 from the United States). Chinese participants trusted their government more, believed COVID preventive measures to be more beneficial, and reported more pandemic compliance and fewer depressive symptoms than U.S. PARTICIPANTS: Trust in government and attitudes towards preventive measures mediated the relationships between NFC and pandemic compliance behaviors among Chinese participants but not U.S. PARTICIPANTS: NFC predicted better mental health outcomes among participants in China compared to U.S. PARTICIPANTS: Trust in government mediated NFC and mental health outcomes among Chinese participants. Trust in government predicted better mental health (fewer depressive symptoms and more life satisfaction) in both the United States and China. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings for promoting mental health and pandemic compliance behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed.

Parent work-life conflict and adolescent adjustment during COVID-19: Mental health and parenting as mediators.

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic is an unprecedented challenging time for parents and adolescents. The present study examines the role of parent work-life conflict on adolescent adjustment (i.e., academic engagement and mental health) and family processes (i.e., parental mental health and parenting) as potential mediators for this association. A total of 692 middle school students (53.2% boys; Mage = 13.54 years, SDage = 0.58) and their parents (29.6% fathers and 70.4% mothers; Mage = 44.75 years, SDage = 4.14 years) completed an online survey in May 2020 in Beijing, China. Results indicated that many parents (24.6%) experienced work-life conflicts amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Findings also showed that parent work-life conflict was negatively associated with youth academic engagement and mental health indirectly through parental mental health difficulties and parenting behavior (parental control, autonomy granting, and parental involvement). In addition, parental mental health difficulties had direct and indirect effects on youth adjustment via parenting behaviors, such that parental involvement and autonomy granting predicted greater academic engagement and covitality (co-occurrence of positive traits and positive mental health), whereas the parental control predicted youth mental health difficulties. Our findings extend prior research by examining the pathways linking parental work-life conflict to youth adjustment during COVID-19. Findings are discussed in terms of how to better support families and promote better youth academic engagement and well-being during COVID-19. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

The roles of resilience, peer relationship, teacher-student relationship on student mental health difficulties during COVID-19.

The present cross-sectional study aimed to (a) expand our understanding of the role of risk and resilience factors for adolescent adjustment during coronavirus disease (COVID-19) and (b) examine personal resilience, peer and teacher-student relationships as protective factors against mental health difficulties. A total of 3,662 students from 4th to 11th grades in Urumchi, China completed a survey in June 2020. Urumchi is an ethnically diverse city, with nearly 40% of the population in this school district being ethnic minority students. The schools of Urumchi closed in February 2020 and reopened in April 2020. The results of latent moderated structural equation modeling suggested that peer victimization was associated with greater mental health difficulties in students. Personal resilience and teacher-student relationships were promotive factors for better mental health and also served as a buffer from the negative effect of peer victimization on mental health. The results also showed divergent patterns for elementary versus secondary school students as well as gender differences. Implications for how schools can support students during COVID-19 were discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).