ArticleFrontiers in psychiatry2025
Anxiety mediates the effect of social media addiction on negative attentional bias: the moderating role of impulsivity.
Article in Frontiers in psychiatry, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Internet addiction and mind-wandering in Chinese college students: chain mediation roles of physical activity and self-control.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Emoji or real emotions? The effect of digitalization on the quality of life through social media addiction - a multigroup SEM analysis, moderated by positive and negative affect.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- Digital Technologies and Student Mental Health: Risks of Social Media and the Promise of Virtual Reality and Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response Interventions.Psychology research and behavior management · 2025Article
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7 authors.
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Abstract
Objective: In China, platforms such as WeChat serve as integral hubs for communication, education, and daily life, rendering social media addiction a pressing concern among university students. Their profound digital immersion, combined with academic pressures, creates a unique contextual milieu where the cognitive ramifications of addiction, including negative attentional bias may be exacerbated. This study therefore aims to investigate the mediating role of anxiety and the moderating role of impulsivity in the relationship between social media addiction and negative attentional bias. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 1,006 Chinese university students (81.1% male; the mean age of participants was 21.45 ± 2.013 years). Participants completed measures of social media addiction, anxiety, negative attentional bias, and impulsivity. Data were analyzed using SPSS and PROCESS macros for mediation and moderation effects with bootstrapping. Results: Social media addiction directly predicted negative attentional bias ( Conclusion: his study reveals a moderated mediation model where anxiety mediates the effect of social media addiction on negative attentional bias, and impulsivity buffers this relationship. These findings highlight the importance of addressing anxiety and impulsivity in interventions for social media addiction-related cognitive biases.
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