ArticleFrontiers in psychology2026
Perceived social support and social/non-social problematic smartphone use among Chinese university students: a cross-sectional study of indirect associations via social anxiety.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2026. 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.
- Professional Identity as a Mechanism Linking Moral Sensitivity to Moral Courage Among Clinical Nurses: A Cross-Sectional Study.Journal of nursing management · 2026Article
- When crisis awareness weakens rational evaluation: the conditional role of information quality in college English teachers' adoption of generative AI.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Influencing factors of smartphone addiction in the era of artificial intelligence: based on the perspective of home-school.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
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5 authors.
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Abstract
Introduction: Problematic smartphone use (PSU) is associated with poorer sleep, impaired attention, reduced academic functioning, and mental and physical health risks. This concern is salient among Chinese university students with smartphone engagement and elevated social anxiety (SA). Prior research links perceived social support (PSS) to lower anxiety and links SA to PSU severity, yet direct PSS-PSU associations are often modest or mixed. Moreover, most studies treat PSU as a unitary construct or examine subtypes, leaving subtype-specific tests of the PSS → SA → PSU pathway limited. Therefore, this study examined whether PSS was indirectly associated with social PSU (SPSU) and non-social PSU (NSPSU) via SA among Chinese university students. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional self-report survey among undergraduates from one university in Jiangsu, China ( Results: The structural model showed marginally acceptable fit (CFI = 0.90; TLI = 0.89; RMSEA = 0.07 [90% CI = (0.06, 0.08)]; SRMR = 0.07). PSS was negatively associated with SA ( Conclusion: Social anxiety was associated with both PSU subtypes and was more strongly linked to NSPSU than SPSU in this sample. Perceived social support was indirectly associated with lower PSU through lower social anxiety, whereas direct associations with PSU subtypes were not significant. Given the cross-sectional design, findings reflect theory-consistent associations rather than causal effects.
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