Difficulties in Emotion Regulation and Mental Health of College Students under Different Management Models in China

The COVID-19 pandemic severely affected the mental health (MH) of college students in China. The enclosed and isolated environment resulting from the pandemic caused distress among college students and affected their emotion regulation ability. Policy adjustments by the Chinese government contributed to large-scale infection, which traumatized students. This study focused on measures college administrators in China took to help college students regulate the emotional impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Difficulties in emotion regulation and MH scales were used to investigate 1200 college students from two universities in China (with 600 students each) implementing distinct management models. The universities were under militarized management and people-oriented management respectively. Independent t-tests for difference analysis were conducted, and a comparative analysis was performed. The results revealed that the management model considerably affected the emotion regulation of students, contributing to students’ MH. The college students under militarized management outperformed those under people-oriented management in terms of both difficulty in emotion regulation and MH. Regression analysis was performed on the correlation between college students’ difficulties in emotion regulation and MH during the COVID-19 pandemic. Consistent with the results, college students’ emotion regulation difficulties had significant predictive power on their MH during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study provides insights into the factors affecting college students’ MH in the current postpandemic context in China and serves as a reference for how colleges and universities can prevent MH problems in the current uncertain environment of China.