Citation

Wan P, Hu J, Li Q. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2023; 20(4).

Copyright

(Copyright © 2023, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute)

DOI

10.3390/ijerph20043431

PMID

36834129

PMCID

PMC9964387

Abstract

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic continues to spread worldwide, and its related stressors are causing a high prevalence of mental health problems among graduate students. This has the potential for long-term effects on their mental well-being. However, few large-scale studies have been conducted on multiple risk and protective factors. Therefore, we aimed to test the impact of social support on depressive symptoms among graduate students and analyze the mediating role of positive coping and the regulatory role of neuroticism. From 1-8 October 2021, 1812 Chinese graduate students were surveyed online. We used a structural equation model to study the mediating role of positive coping in the relationship between social support and depressive symptoms and used the Hayes PROCESS macro to conduct mediating analysis. The incidence of depressive symptoms was 10.40%. These results showed that positive coping influenced the social support's influence on depression symptoms to some extent. Moreover, neuroticism regulates the indirect relationship between social support and depressive symptoms through active coping. Further research is needed to assess the impact of various forms of social support on graduate students' mental health and to develop strategies for maintaining their well-being, such as network mindfulness.

Language: en

Keywords

COVID-19; depressive symptoms; social support; graduate student; neuroticism; positive coping