ArticleFrontiers in psychology2026
Appearance anxiety and college students' exercise participation: a chain mediation model of negative body image and exercise self-efficacy.
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 1 paper.
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1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Social Media Disorder, Mental Health, and Physical Activity.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
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5 authors.
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Abstract
Objective: This study explores the relationship between appearance anxiety (AA) and exercise participation and constructs a chain mediation model through the mediating effects of negative body image (NBI) and exercise self-efficacy. Methods: This study employed the Appearance Anxiety Scale-Brief Version, the Negative Physical Self Scale-General Appearance Subscale (NPSS-G), the Self-efficacy for Exercise (SEE) scale, and the Physical Activity Rating Scale (PARS-3) to conduct a questionnaire survey among Chinese college students. A total of 1,145 questionnaires were distributed, and 1,052 valid responses were collected, yielding an effective response rate of 91.88%. Structural equation modeling (SEM) and the bootstrap method were used to analyze the relationships among the variables and the mediating effects, with statistical significance set at Results: The results revealed that appearance anxiety was significantly negatively correlated with exercise participation and exercise self-efficacy and significantly positively correlated with negative body image. Both negative body image and exercise self-efficacy significantly mediated the relationship between appearance anxiety and participation in exercise, and together, they formed a significant chain-mediating relationship. Discussion: The findings of this study indicate a chain-linked association pattern among appearance anxiety, negative body image, exercise self-efficacy, and exercise participation that aligns with the theoretical model, suggesting that appearance-related negative cognitions may be connected to exercise participation through body image evaluation and exercise belief. In practice, while promoting exercise participation, universities should concurrently emphasize diverse aesthetic education, body acceptance support, the enhancement of exercise self-efficacy, and the optimization of the exercise context to strengthen the sustainability of college students' exercise participation.
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