Abstract
Teacher support has been shown to enhance adolescent mental health. However, the effects of negative emotions and resilience in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being in adolescents are still unknown. This study investigated (a) the mediating role of negative emotions in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being, (b) the mediating role of resilience in the association between teacher support and mental well-being, (c) the serial mediating role of negative emotions and then resilience in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being, and (d) the parallel mediating role of the five dimensions of resilience and the three factors of negative emotions in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being. Participants were 1228 Chinese adolescents (age, M = 15.43 years; 53.09% male). Participants filled out questionnaires regarding teacher support, negative emotions, resilience, and mental well-being. After controlling for age and gender, we found that teacher support, negative emotions, and resilience were significantly linked with mental well-being. Moreover, negative emotions and resilience were found to mediate the relationship between teacher support and adolescent mental well-being, accounting for 5.45 and 30.00% of the total effect, respectively. We also found that teacher support enhances mental well-being by decreasing negative emotions and then increasing resilience. This serial mediating effect accounted for 8.48% of the total effect. Finally, the mediating effect of resilience between teacher support and mental well-being was significantly greater than the mediating effects of the other two indirect effects (negative emotions in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being, negative emotions and then resilience in the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being). And the parallel mediation model showed that teacher support can promote adolescent mental well-being by increasing goal planning, affect control, and help-seeking behavior, and decreasing depression. These findings suggest a process through which negative emotions can decrease resilience and identify the mediating effects of negative emotions (including the three dimensions of negative emotions) and resilience (including the five factors of resilience) in the relationship between teacher support and adolescent mental well-being.
Highlights
Mental well-being is a dynamic state that allows individuals to be happy and satisfied with life, find purpose in their lives, realize their given potential, form and maintain relationships with others, and feel in control of their own lives (Ryff and Keyes, 1995)
A previous study showed that the Chinese version of WarwickEdinburgh Mental Well-Being Scale (WEMWBS) had good reliability and validity for the assessment of mental well-being in Chinese adolescents (Zhao et al, 2019)
The results of this study show that the mediating effects of negative emotions and resilience may contribute to understanding the relationship between teacher support and mental well-being in a sample of Chinese adolescents
Summary
Mental well-being is a dynamic state that allows individuals to be happy and satisfied with life, find purpose in their lives, realize their given potential, form and maintain relationships with others, and feel in control of their own lives (Ryff and Keyes, 1995). The current study investigated the association between teacher support and mental well-being of adolescents, as well as the influence of negative emotions and resilience in this relationship. In line with this model, one study reported that older adults with low community social capital, such as social cohesion and community social ties, were vulnerable to depression when they faced stress (An et al, 2018) These results indicate that a lack of social support (i.e., teacher support) may lead to poor mental health by increasing negative emotional states, such as anxiety and depression. Students who perceive themselves as receiving less support from teachers may feel that they are worthless and unlovable; adolescents tend to have deficits in the self-system that manifest as low satisfaction of autonomy need and poor academic performance (Zhang et al, 2018) During this time, they may be more vulnerable to negative emotions. Hypothesis 4: Teacher support is indirectly associated with adolescent mental well-being by negative emotions and resilience
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