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During the COVID-19 epidemic, quarantine and financial disadvantages might exacerbate social anxiety among impoverished college students. Based on the hardiness model and the social support buffering model, the present study proposed and verified a dual moderation model to investigate the effects of hardiness on social anxiety and the moderating roles of gender and perceived social support. The hardiness scale, the perceived social support scale, and the social anxiety subscale of the self-consciousness scale were administered to 673 Chinese college students aged 18 to 23 years who were recognized as impoverished by the Chinese authorities and provided with funding. The results revealed that (1) hardiness had a significant negative effect on social anxiety, (2) perceived social support moderated the effect of hardiness on social anxiety, and (3) gender moderated the effect of hardiness on social anxiety. The dual moderated model proposed in the study provides practical implications for helping impoverished college students cope with social anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the hardiness model and the perspective of different treatment by parents, this study developed and validated a moderated mediation model to explore the direct effect of hardiness on the mental health of Chinese funded college students (FCSs), the mediating role of social support, and the moderating role of only-child (OC) /non-only-child (NOC) status. A hardiness scale, mental health scale, and perceived social support scale were used to examine information on 673 Chinese FCSs. Hardiness had a significantly positive effect on the mental health of FCSs. Mediation analysis indicated that social support mediated the relationship between hardiness and the mental health of FCSs. The moderated mediation model analysis indicated that the OC/NOC status moderated the second half of the mediation model. The results suggest that the hardiness model is applicable to FCSs from China and elucidate the internal influence mechanism between hardiness and mental health. On the basis of the findings of this study, suggestions are presented in this paper for college education management.

Previous studies have documented that psychological distress is related to problematic mobile phone use (PMPU), and sporadic research has investigated the potential mechanisms underlying the association. Based on the cognitive-behavioral model of pathological Internet use (PIU), the self-control theory, and the problem-behavior theory, this study aimed to examine the mediating role of maladaptive cognitions toward mobile phones and the moderating role of effortful control between psychological distress and PMPU. Data were collected from 1,799 secondary school students (45.1% male; Mage = 14.07, SD = 1.69) using four self-reported questionnaires. The results revealed that maladaptive cognitions toward mobile phones partially mediated the relationship between psychological distress and PMPU. In addition, effortful control as a protective factor attenuated the indirect effect from psychological distress to PMPU. These findings advanced the understanding of the etiology of PMPU and the need to develop effective strategies for prevention, suggesting that schools and families should pay additional attention to students with psychological distress. Targeted interventions for integrating online and offline worlds and effortful control training programs may help to prevent adolescents from engaging in PMPU.