Xu Lijuan, Li Li
School of Education, Jiangxi Institute of Applied Science and Technology, Nanchang, China.
Faculty of Psychology, Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
Front Psychol. 2024 Jul 16;15:1430539. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1430539. eCollection 2024.
Social anxiety has consistently emerged as a prominent manifestation of mental health issues among college students. Though the relationship between upward social comparison and social anxiety has been extensively addressed in previous literature, little attention has been paid to the underlying mechanisms at play.
The present study used a questionnaire survey to test whether upward social comparison may be associated with social anxiety in Chinese college students. The mediating role of relative deprivation and rumination was also examined.
In total, 463 college students were recruited to complete four scales, including the Upward Social Comparison Scale, the Relative Deprivation Scale, the Ruminative Thinking Scale, and the Social Anxiety Scale.
The results show that upward social comparison was significantly positively correlated with relative deprivation, rumination, and social anxiety ( = 0.30, 0.31, and 0.27, respectively; < 0.01). Second, relative deprivation was positively correlated with rumination and social anxiety ( = 0.40 and 0.17, respectively; < 0.01). Finally, rumination was positively correlated with social anxiety ( = 0.47, < 0.01). Moreover, upward social comparison positively predicts social anxiety, with an effect value of 0.12, while rumination plays a mediating role between upward social comparison and social anxiety, with an effect value of 0.07, and the 95% confidence interval for the indirect effect is 0.04-0.11. Separately, the chain mediation of relative deprivation and rumination had an effect value of 0.03, and the 95% confidence interval for the indirect effect is 0.02-0.05.
This research highlights the relationship between upward social comparison and social anxiety in Chinese society and revealed the mediating mechanisms between them, deepening our understanding of how upward social comparison increases social anxiety.
社交焦虑一直是大学生心理健康问题的一个突出表现。尽管先前的文献中已广泛探讨了向上社会比较与社交焦虑之间的关系，但对其中潜在机制的关注却很少。
本研究采用问卷调查法，以检验向上社会比较是否可能与中国大学生的社交焦虑相关。同时还考察了相对剥夺感和反刍思维的中介作用。
共招募了463名大学生，让他们完成四个量表，包括向上社会比较量表、相对剥夺感量表、反刍思维量表和社交焦虑量表。
结果显示，向上社会比较与相对剥夺感、反刍思维和社交焦虑均呈显著正相关（分别为r = 0.30、0.31和0.27；p < 0.01）。其次，相对剥夺感与反刍思维和社交焦虑呈正相关（分别为r = 0.40和0.17；p < 0.01）。最后，反刍思维与社交焦虑呈正相关（r = 0.47，p < 0.01）。此外，向上社会比较正向预测社交焦虑，效应值为0.12，而反刍思维在向上社会比较和社交焦虑之间起中介作用，效应值为0.07，间接效应的95%置信区间为0.04 - 0.11。另外，相对剥夺感和反刍思维的链式中介效应值为0.03，间接效应的95%置信区间为0.02 - 0.05。
本研究突出了中国社会中向上社会比较与社交焦虑之间的关系，并揭示了它们之间的中介机制，加深了我们对向上社会比较如何增加社交焦虑的理解。
