Department of Applied Social Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong SAR, P. R. China.
Department of Early Childhood Education, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, P. R. China.
BMC Public Health. 2023 Jun 7;23(1):1106. doi: 10.1186/s12889-023-16040-9.
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought challenges to families around the world. The prolonged school closures in Hong Kong have forced young students to stay at home and adapt to remote learning for over a year, putting their mental health conditions at risk. Focusing on primary school students and their parents, the main objective of our research is to investigate the socioemotional factors and their associations with mental health conditions.
A total of 700 Hong Kong primary schoolers (mean age = 8.2) reported their emotional experiences, loneliness, and academic self-concept via a user-friendly online survey; 537 parents reported depression and anxiety, perceived child depression and anxiety, and social support. Responses from students and parents were paired to account for the family context. Structural Equation Modeling was used for correlations and regressions.
The results of students' responses showed that positive emotional experiences were negatively associated with loneliness and positively related to academic self-concept among students. Furthermore, the paired sample results showed that, during the one-year societal lockdown and remote learning period, the socioemotional factors were associated with mental health conditions among primary school students and their parents. Among our family sample in Hong Kong, evidence supports the unique negative association between students-reported positive emotional experiences and parents-reported child depression and anxiety, as well as between social support and parents' depression and anxiety.
These findings highlighted the associations between socioemotional factors and mental health among young primary schoolers during the societal lockdown. We thus call for more attention to the societal lockdown and remote learning context, especially since the social distancing practice could be "the new normal" for our society to handle the future pandemic crisis.
新冠疫情给全世界的家庭带来了挑战。香港长时间的学校停课迫使年幼的学生们待在家里，适应了一年多的远程学习，这使他们的心理健康状况面临风险。本研究聚焦于小学生及其家长，主要目的是调查社会情感因素及其与心理健康状况的关联。
共有 700 名香港小学生（平均年龄=8.2 岁）通过一个用户友好的在线调查报告了他们的情绪体验、孤独感和学业自我概念；537 位家长报告了抑郁和焦虑、感知到的孩子的抑郁和焦虑以及社会支持。学生和家长的回应被配对以考虑家庭环境。结构方程模型用于相关性和回归分析。
学生的回应结果表明，积极的情绪体验与孤独感呈负相关，与学生的学业自我概念呈正相关。此外，配对样本的结果表明，在一年的社会封锁和远程学习期间，社会情感因素与小学生及其家长的心理健康状况有关。在我们香港的家庭样本中，有证据表明学生报告的积极情绪体验与家长报告的孩子的抑郁和焦虑之间，以及社会支持与家长的抑郁和焦虑之间存在独特的负相关。
这些发现强调了社会封锁期间社会情感因素与年轻小学生心理健康之间的关联。因此，我们呼吁更多地关注社会封锁和远程学习环境，特别是因为社会距离实践可能成为我们社会应对未来大流行病危机的“新常态”。
