IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v18y2021i4p1636-d496068.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychological Well-Being in Chinese College Students: Mediation Effect of Mindfulness

Author

Listed:
  • Chien-Chung Huang

    (School of Social Work, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ 08901, USA)

  • Yuanfa Tan

    (Research Institute of Social Development, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, Chengdu 611130, China)

  • Shannon P. Cheung

    (School of Social Work, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ 08901, USA)

  • Hongwei Hu

    (School of Public Administration and Policy, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China)

Abstract

Literature on the antecedents of psychological well-being (PWB) has found that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and mindfulness are associated with PWB; less is known, however, about the role of mindfulness, a type of emotional and self-regulation, in the pathway between ACEs and PWB. This study used data from 1871 college students across China to examine the relation between ACEs and PWB, and whether the relation was mediated by mindfulness. The findings from structural equation modelling indicate a statistically significant negative association between ACEs and PWB, while mindfulness was strongly and positively associated with PWB. The effect of ACEs on PWB was reduced once mindfulness was controlled for in the analysis. This provides evidence that mindfulness was able to partially mediate the effects of negative life experiences on psychological well-being. This calls for mindfulness interventions targeted toward students with a history of ACEs to buffer the effects of ACEs on PWB.

Suggested Citation

  • Chien-Chung Huang & Yuanfa Tan & Shannon P. Cheung & Hongwei Hu, 2021. "Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychological Well-Being in Chinese College Students: Mediation Effect of Mindfulness," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(4), pages 1-12, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:4:p:1636-:d:496068
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/4/1636/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/4/1636/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Reina, Christopher S. & Kudesia, Ravi S., 2020. "Wherever you go, there you become: How mindfulness arises in everyday situations," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 78-96.
    2. Long, Mark C., 2008. "College quality and early adult outcomes," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 588-602, October.
    3. Shannon Cheung & Xiaoxia Xie & Chien-chung Huang, 2020. "Mind Over Matter: Mindfulness, Income, Resilience, and Life Quality of Vocational High School Students in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(16), pages 1-13, August.
    4. Li, Hongbin & Meng, Lingsheng & Shi, Xinzheng & Wu, Binzhen, 2012. "Does attending elite colleges pay in China?," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 78-88.
    5. Huang, Chien-Chung & Chen, Yafan & Greene, Loren & Cheung, Shannon & Wei, Yuhan, 2019. "Resilience and emotional and behavioral problems of adolescents in China: Effects of a short-term and intensive mindfulness and life skills training," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 291-297.
    6. Sheung-Tak Cheng, 2009. "Generativity in Later Life: Perceived Respect From Younger Generations as a Determinant of Goal Disengagement and Psychological Well-being," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 64(1), pages 45-54.
    7. Michael A. Shields & Stephen Wheatley Price, 2005. "Exploring the economic and social determinants of psychological well‐being and perceived social support in England," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 168(3), pages 513-537, July.
    8. Lu, Shuang & Huang, Chien-Chung & Rios, Juan, 2017. "Mindfulness and academic performance: An example of migrant children in China," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 53-59.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Borazon, Elaine Quintana & Chuang, Hsueh-Hua, 2023. "Resilience in educational system: A systematic review and directions for future research," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 99(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chienchung Huang & Xiaoxia Xie & Shannon P. Cheung & Yuqing Zhou & Ganghui Ying, 2021. "Job Demands, Resources, and Burnout in Social Workers in China: Mediation Effect of Mindfulness," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(19), pages 1-15, October.
    2. Chien-Chung Huang & Shuang Lu & Juan Rios & Yafan Chen & Marci Stringham & Shannon Cheung, 2020. "Associations between Mindfulness, Executive Function, Social-Emotional Skills, and Quality of Life among Hispanic Children," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(21), pages 1-12, October.
    3. Chen, Yafan & Xie, Xiaoxia & Huang, Chien-Chung, 2021. "Resilience of vocational students with disadvantaged characteristics in China: The role of mindfulness," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    4. Shannon Cheung & Xiaoxia Xie & Chien-chung Huang, 2020. "Mind Over Matter: Mindfulness, Income, Resilience, and Life Quality of Vocational High School Students in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(16), pages 1-13, August.
    5. Blanchflower, David G. & Oswald, Andrew J., 2008. "Is well-being U-shaped over the life cycle?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(8), pages 1733-1749, April.
    6. Scott Rozelle & Yiran Xia & Dimitris Friesen & Bronson Vanderjack & Nourya Cohen, 2020. "Moving Beyond Lewis: Employment and Wage Trends in China’s High- and Low-Skilled Industries and the Emergence of an Era of Polarization," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 62(4), pages 555-589, December.
    7. Bo, Shiyu & Liu, Jing & Shiu, Ji-Liang & Song, Yan & Zhou, Sen, 2019. "Admission mechanisms and the mismatch between colleges and students: Evidence from a large administrative dataset from China," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 27-37.
    8. Cory Koedel, 2009. "Postsecondary Education Structure," Working Papers 0906, Department of Economics, University of Missouri, revised 04 Oct 2010.
    9. Rainer Winkelmann, 2009. "Unemployment, Social Capital, and Subjective Well-Being," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 10(4), pages 421-430, August.
    10. Song, Yang, 2019. "Sorting, school performance and quality: Evidence from China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 238-261.
    11. Meier, Volker & Schiopu, Ioana, 2020. "Enrollment expansion and quality differentiation across higher education systems," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 43-53.
    12. Hongbin Li & Huan Wang & Claire Cousineau & Matthew Boswell, 2023. "What Can Students Gain from China's Higher Education?," Asian Economic Policy Review, Japan Center for Economic Research, vol. 18(2), pages 287-304, July.
    13. Frijters, Paul & Johnston, David W. & Knott, Rachel & Torgler, Benno, 2021. "Resilience to Disaster: Evidence from Daily Wellbeing Data," IZA Discussion Papers 14220, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. D. Flannery & J. Cullinan, 2014. "Where they go, what they do and why it matters: the importance of geographic accessibility and social class for decisions relating to higher education institution type, degree level and field of study," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(24), pages 2952-2965, August.
    15. Binder, Martin & Coad, Alex, 2013. "“I'm afraid I have bad news for you…” Estimating the impact of different health impairments on subjective well-being," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 155-167.
    16. Chia-Yueh Hsu & Shu-Sen Chang & Paul Yip, 2017. "Individual-, household- and neighbourhood-level characteristics associated with life satisfaction: A multilevel analysis of a population-based sample from Hong Kong," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(16), pages 3700-3717, December.
    17. Wang, Kun & Marbut, Alexander R. & Suntai, Zainab & Zheng, Dianhan & Chen, Xiayu, 2022. "Patterns in older adults' perceived chronic stressor types and cognitive functioning trajectories: Are perceived chronic stressors always bad?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 311(C).
    18. Tong Zou & Yikun Su & Yaowu Wang, 2018. "Examining Relationships between Social Capital, Emotion Experience and Life Satisfaction for Sustainable Community," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-16, July.
    19. Clark, Andrew & Knabe, Andreas & Rätzel, Steffen, 2010. "Boon or bane? Others' unemployment, well-being and job insecurity," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 52-61, January.
    20. Iddisah Sulemana, 2015. "The Effect of Fear of Crime and Crime Victimization on Subjective Well-Being in Africa," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 121(3), pages 849-872, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:4:p:1636-:d:496068. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.