A Chain Mediation Model for Psychological Maltreatment and Adolescents Social Media Dependence

This study aims to explore the chain‐mediated effects of difficulty in identifying feelings, difficulty describing feelings, and depression on the relationship between psychological maltreatment and adolescent social media dependence, providing theoretical support for alleviating adolescent social media dependence. The present study obtained 2243 valid questionnaires from adolescents in China, assessing their difficulty in identifying feelings, difficulty describing feelings, levels of depression, experiences of psychological maltreatment, and degree of social media dependence. The data were subjected to descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, and mediation effect analysis, with demographic variables such as age and gender controlled for their potential impact on the results. The findings revealed significant positive correlations between psychological maltreatment and adolescent social media dependence, difficulty describing feelings, difficulty in identifying feelings, and depression. Additionally, difficulty describing feelings, difficulty in identifying feelings, and depression were all significantly positively correlated with social media dependence. After incorporating the mediating variables, psychological maltreatment remained significantly positively correlated with adolescents' social media dependence, difficulty in identifying feelings, difficulty describing feelings, and depression. Both difficulty in identifying feelings and depression were significantly positively correlated with adolescents' social media dependence, and significant positive correlations were also observed between difficulty in identifying feelings and difficulty describing feelings and between these difficulties and depression. Notably, in the chain mediation model constructed in this study, the path from difficulty describing feelings directly to social media dependence was not statistically significant. This finding suggests that more pathways may be mediated through difficulty in identifying feelings and depression. This study provides a detailed examination of the mediating roles of difficulty describing feelings, difficulty in identifying feelings, and depression in the relationship between psychological maltreatment and adolescent social media dependence, offering a theoretical basis for preventing psychological maltreatment and intervening in the development of adolescent social media dependence and depression.