Frontiers in Psychology最新文献

Background: In the global context of promoting active health, the issue of insufficient exercise adherence among women is increasingly prominent. As digital health intervention tools, the efficacy of fitness apps hinges on their ability to provide "need support" that satisfies users' deep psychological needs. However, the internal psychological mechanism from need support to long-term behavioral adherence, particularly the serial mediation pathway for female users, requires further exploration.

Methods: Grounded in Self-Determination Theory and Social Cognitive Theory, this study examined a sequential mediation model in which self-efficacy and health locus of control functioned as mediators. A cross-sectional questionnaire survey was administered to 721 female fitness app users recruited from 12 cities across 9 provinces in eastern, central, and western China. Data analyses were conducted using SPSS 27.0 and the PROCESS 4.0. Pearson correlation analyses and multiple linear regression were employed to test the associations and direct effects among variables, while mediation effects were examined using bootstrap procedures with 5,000 resamples and bias-corrected 95% confidence intervals. Indirect effects were considered statistically significant when the confidence intervals did not include zero.

Results: (1) Fitness app need support significantly and positively predicted women's exercise adherence behavior (total effect = 0.341, 95% CI [0.281, 0.400]). (2) Self-efficacy and perceived health control both played significant mediating roles, with mediation effect values of 0.098 and 0.079, respectively. (3) Self-efficacy and perceived health control formed a significant serial mediation pathway (effect value = 0.023). The total indirect effect, comprising this serial path and the two independent mediation paths, was 0.200, accounting for 58.65% of the total effect.

Conclusion: Need support from fitness apps can directly promote women's exercise adherence. It also indirectly fosters long-term behavioral persistence by sequentially enhancing users' self-efficacy and perceived health control. This internal psychological sequence provides evidence of a chain mechanism for understanding the psychological "black box" of how digital health technologies influence behavior. The findings offer crucial theoretical and practical implications for the future design and optimization of fitness apps oriented toward women's deep psychological needs.

Since the early 21st century, team science has significantly influenced emerging perspectives, processes, and expectations across various industries, human development, and scholarly activities. Research over the past 25 years-drawing on psychology, management, social psychology, anthropology, organizational sciences, and sociology-has shaped best practices and redefined how academics and practitioners approach collaborative work. Despite substantial progress in understanding team dynamics, a critical gap remains: the absence of a clearly defined professional pathway for team scientists and science workers. Specifically, there is a lack of a secure, structured pipeline that supports training, recognition, and career advancement in team science roles. This paper addresses the limited presence of systematic organizational strategies that help science workers from the early stages of their careers through long-term professional growth. As higher education confronts a shifting paradigm, institutions must now prepare students not only as disciplinary experts but also as collaborators equipped to thrive in a cross-disciplinary, problem-solving environment that embraces the workforce competencies employers seek. We examine the organizational requirements and challenges necessary to ensure success in science careers, emphasizing developmental training, robust mentorship, the professionalization and institutionalization of team structures, and sustaining collaboration. These elements are essential for preparing a workforce that is capable, resilient, and ready for the demands of future collaborative scientific endeavors.

Introduction: Within the context of growing scholarly interest in the role of positive emotions and virtues in music education, this study explores experiences of gratitude during musicking among members of diverse cultures and ages (10-79) in a community orchestra in South Africa.

Methods: A qualitative intrinsic case study design was employed to explore 13 orchestra members' experiences of gratitude while musicking, using open-ended, semi-structured interviews. The data was thematically analysed using ATLAS.ti 25.

Results: Three central themes were generated from the data analysis: (1) gratitude as experienced across ages (10-79) and cultures within the orchestra, (2) the triadic view of gratitude, encompassing benevolent intentions, benefits received, and the roles of beneficiaries and benefactors within the orchestra community, and (3) three upward cycles-the chain of appreciation, the chain of reciprocity, and the broaden-and-build features of gratitude-that foster social cohesion, prosocial behaviour, individual well-being, and better musical performances.

Discussion: The study demonstrated that understanding appreciation and reciprocity chains can encourage gratitude, which in turn broadens musical and interpersonal skills and builds flourishing individuals and music communities.

Background: Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have enabled the development of AI-based self-study rooms that may influence K-12 learners' motivation, engagement, enjoyment, and self-regulation. This study was guided by Zimmerman's self-regulated learning framework to explore whether AI-equipped self-study environments can foster more autonomous and effective learning compared to traditional self-study settings.

Methods: A quasi-experimental design was conducted with 383 primary-school students in mainland China, randomly assigned to either an experimental group (AI self-study rooms) or a control group (traditional self-study). Over a 10-week period, participants completed standardized pre- and post-tests, as well as validated scales measuring motivation, engagement, enjoyment, and self-regulation. Data were analyzed using ANCOVA to control for baseline equivalences.

Results: Findings revealed that students exposed to AI self-study rooms recorded notably higher post-intervention scores on all measured constructs than those in traditional self-study settings. ANCOVA results showed that group membership significantly affected motivation (p < 0.001, η² = 0.171), self-regulation (p < 0.001, η² = 0.238), enjoyment (p < 0.001, η² = 0.201), and engagement (p < 0.001, η² = 0.220). These outcomes suggest that AI-enhanced environments can better support self-regulated learning processes through personalized feedback, adaptive content recommendations, and data-driven scaffolding.

Conclusion: This study suggests that AI study rooms may be able to provide K-12 students with a more customized, responsive, and engaging learning experience that improves key elements of their learning. Future inquiries could employ longitudinal designs, diversify educational contexts, and integrate broader psychological variables to enrich understanding of how AI-driven tools might shape learners' trajectories over time.

Introduction: Athlete burnout presents a significant challenge for adolescent athletes, with profound implications for their mental health and career progression. This study employs an emotional perspective to examine the relationships between admiration, positive affect, negative affect, and athlete burnout, aiming to identify effective strategies for mitigating burnout among this population.

Methods: The study utilized the "Admiration Scale", the "Positive and Negative Affect Schedule" and the "Athlete Burnout Questionnaire" to collect data. A total of 1,544 adolescent athletes participated in the study. The collected data were analyzed using three parallel mediation models within the Process macro of SPSS software to elucidate the relationship between admiration and each dimension of athlete burnout, as well as to examine the mediating roles of positive affect and negative affect in this relationship.

Results: Admiration had a significant negative relationship with athlete burnout. There were significant differences in the reduced sense of achievement and devaluation of sports practice among the adolescent athletes who took different objects as models of admiration. Positive affect and negative affect indirectly associate the relationship between admiration and athlete burnout (physical and emotional exhaustion, reduced sense of achievement, devaluation of sports practice). Furthermore, the mediating effect of positive affect was stronger than that of negative affect in all three models.

Conclusions: Admiration may serve a role in managing symptoms of burnout in the adolescent athlete, and that this effect occurs through the effect on positive affect and negative affect.

Objective: This study aimed to explore the association mechanism between psychological capital and pre-competition anxiety in adolescent basketball players, and to verify the independent and chain mediating roles of mental fatigue and achievement motivation.

Methods: A total of 510 Chinese adolescent basketball players from Sichuan Province completed the Psychological Capital Questionnaire, Athlete Burnout Questionnaire, Individual Differences in Achievement Tendency Scale, and Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 24 h pre-competition.

Results: Psychological capital was positively correlated with state self-confidence and negatively correlated with cognitive/somatic anxiety and mental fatigue (p < 0.01); mental fatigue was positively associated with state anxiety (p < 0.01); achievement motivation correlated positively with state self-confidence and negatively with state anxiety (p < 0.05). Mental fatigue (indirect effect = -0.096) and achievement motivation (indirect effect = -0.039) independently partially mediated the psychological capital-pre-competition anxiety link; achievement motivation also mediated psychological capital and state self-confidence (indirect effect = 0.078). Additionally, mental fatigue and achievement motivation exerted a chain mediating effect (indirect effect = 0.011) between psychological capital and pre-competition anxiety.

Conclusion: Psychological capital is directly negatively associated with pre-competition anxiety in adolescent basketball players and indirectly alleviates anxiety by reducing mental fatigue and optimizing achievement motivation. Based on the above findings, targeted psychological interventions for different subgroups of adolescent basketball players are proposed as follows: improve psychological capital and reduce failure-avoidance motivation for younger athletes; address reduced sense of accomplishment for centers; strengthen pre-competition physical relaxation training for females; and provide more competitive opportunities for substitutes to build self-confidence.

Introduction: Generative artificial intelligence (GAI) and social media are increasingly integrated in university learning, reshaping collaboration and psychological outcomes. This study proposes Intelligent Media-Coordinated Learning Experience (IMCLE) to capture perceived coordination quality in GAI-social media learning, including empowerment effectiveness, collaboration facilitation, feedback visibility, and boundary safety.

Methods: Using two-wave survey data from Chinese university students, we applied an explanation-prediction-necessity strategy integrating PLS-SEM, artificial neural networks (ANN), and necessary condition analysis (NCA). We examined how IMCLE cues relate to collaborative learning (CL), psychological distress (PD), and psychological well-being (PWB), with perceived support (PSup) as a moderator.

Results: All IMCLE cues positively predicted CL, which in turn enhanced PWB. IMCLE cues also positively predicted PD, and PD formed a significant indirect pathway to PWB, indicating that gains and strain may co-occur in highly coordinated learning. PSup weakened the IMCLE.PD relationships and attenuated the PD.PWB association. ANN confirmed the predictive salience of key IMCLE cues and showed nonlinear importance patterns, while NCA identified threshold conditions for high PWB.

Discussion: IMCLE has a dual effect, producing both collaborative gains and psychological strain. The findings inform feedback governance and support infrastructure design to improve students' digital well-being.

Background: Medical and health sciences students face significant academic, clinical, and social pressures that increase their risk of psychological distress. Prior studies report elevated levels of depression, anxiety, and stress in this group. Barriers to accessing mental health services such as stigma, confidentiality concerns, limited awareness, and fear of negative consequences further compound this risk. Understanding the prevalence, determinants, and service barriers is essential for developing effective support systems.

Aim: To determine the prevalence and determinants of depression, anxiety, and stress among medical and health sciences students at Batterjee Medical College, Saudi Arabia, and to identify barriers limiting their access to mental health services.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 384 students using a self-administered online survey. The Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21) assessed psychological distress, while the Barriers to Mental Health Services Scale-Revised (BMHSS-R) measured perceived obstacles to seeking help. Data were analyzed to identify prevalence, associated demographic and academic factors, and barriers to mental health service utilization.

Results: Depression, anxiety, and stress (DAS) were evaluated using validated DASS-21 subscales demonstrating excellent internal consistency (α > 0.88). The total BMHSS score showed significant associations with academic factors, including major, year of study, and GPA (p ≤ 0.01). Gender was a strong predictor of psychological distress, with female students reporting significantly higher mean scores across all DAS domains (p ≤ 0.000439). Age was significantly associated with anxiety and stress (p ≤ 0.024). Students residing in urban areas reported higher anxiety scores than those in rural regions (p = 0.029). These findings identify gender, age, and residence as key demographic risk factors requiring targeted interventions.

Conclusion: The study found a high prevalence of depression, anxiety, and stress among medical and health sciences students, with demographic and academic characteristics emerging as significant correlates. Intrinsic barriers, such as stigma and self-reliance, and extrinsic barriers, including accessibility and cost, further limited help-seeking and compounded psychological distress. These findings emphasize the need for comprehensive institutional mental health strategies and longitudinal research to enhance student wellbeing.

Although the specific reasons for exercise motivation and the emotions felt during it are both important for physical activity (PA), little is known about how they combine to form distinct psychological profiles. This study used a person-centered approach to identify these latent profiles based on specific exercise motives and exercise-induced emotions among Chinese college students, and examined their associations with gender and PA. We recruited 1,586 undergraduates from a university in southern China (M_age  = 19.13, SD = 1.23; 468 males, 1,118 females). They completed the Motives for Physical Activities Measure-Revised (MPAM-R), the Exercise-Induced Feeling Inventory (EFI), and the International Physical Activity Questionnaire-Short Form (IPAQ-SF). Latent profile analysis (LPA) was conducted to identify subgroups based on their motivational and emotional patterns. The results supported a three-profile model: Low-Enjoyment and High-Exhaustion Profile (14.7%), Appearance-Driven and Ambivalent-Affect Profile (50.6%), and Enjoyment-Driven and High-Vitality Profile (34.8%). Gender significantly predicted profile membership, with male students more likely to belong to the Enjoyment-Driven and High-Vitality Profile. Physical activity levels differed significantly across the latent profiles in a specific pattern. The Enjoyment-Driven and High-Vitality Profile demonstrated a higher level of physical activity than both the Low-Enjoyment and High-Exhaustion Profile and the Appearance-Driven and Ambivalent-Affect Profile. No significant difference in physical activity was found between the latter two profiles. These findings reveal three distinct experiential patterns and highlight the large subgroup driven by appearance concerns as a key target for interventions aimed at fostering more autonomous motivation and positive affective experiences.

Background: Between 4.8 and 26% of adults presenting to gender dysphoria clinics have autism. Both autistic people and transgender and gender nonconforming (TGNC) people have higher rates of mental health conditions including anxiety and depression and more difficulties with executive functioning, all of which impact quality of life.

Methods: We characterized relationships among mental health, gender nonconformity, and autism in a sample of 54 TGNC individuals, 44.4% of whom were autistic (29.6% formally diagnosed and 14.8% self-identified). We analyzed traits continuously (using the Autism Spectrum Quotient).

Results: Anxiety was the strongest predictor of executive functioning scores, while the contributions of depression symptoms and autistic traits did not rise to the level of statistical significance.

Conclusion: Findings suggest that clinicians can support TGNC autistic people by helping them with their mental health, particularly with managing their anxiety.