A study on the association between anxiety level and family parenting styles of university students in the eastern coastal region of China

Abstract

In today’s society, psychological problems are frequent among university students, especially anxiety. Family of origin is inextricably linked to a person’s mental health. Parents often have different parenting styles in the process of educating their children, and different parenting styles have different impacts on children’s psychological development. This research explores the correlation between college students’ anxiety and their family parenting styles by taking college students in the eastern coastal region as an example. This paper investigates how to prevent and alleviate college students’ anxiety by improving family parenting styles. The Chinese version of the Short-form Parenting Style Scale (S-EMBU-C) and the Sel Assessment Scale for Anxiety (SAS) were used to survey university students in Jiangsu.Family parenting style and anxiety level of university students in Jiangsu were analysed by the statistical software SPSS. The following conclusions were obtained in this study: The anxiety level of male students is higher than that of female students. Boys’ families are more likely to develop a parental rejection type of family parenting, and girls’ families are more likely to develop a parental emotional warmth type of family upbringing. The College student anxiety was positively correlated with the following factors: the rejection factor and the overprotection factor on the father and mother scales. The effect of paternal and maternal rejection on college students is actually the most important of all parenting styles. In the case of only children and non-only children, parental rejection is more likely to develop in families with only children.