Relational Victimization and Video Game Addiction among Female College Students during COVID-19 Pandemic: The Roles of Social Anxiety and Parasocial Relationship

Gengfeng Niu; Siyu Jin; Fang Xu; Shanyan Lin; Zongkui Zhou; Claudio Longobardi

doi:10.3390/ijerph192416909

Relational Victimization and Video Game Addiction among Female College Students during COVID-19 Pandemic: The Roles of Social Anxiety and Parasocial Relationship

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Dec 16;19(24):16909. doi: 10.3390/ijerph192416909.

Authors

Gengfeng Niu^{1

2

3

4}, Siyu Jin^{1

2}, Fang Xu^{1

2}, Shanyan Lin⁵, Zongkui Zhou^{1

2

3

4}, Claudio Longobardi⁵

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Human Development and Mental Health of Hubei Province, School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan 430079, China.
² Key Laboratory of Adolescent Cyberpsychology and Behavior (CCNU), Ministry of Education, Wuhan 430079, China.
³ Center for Research on Internet Literacy and Behavior, Central China Normal University, Wuhan 430079, China.
⁴ Collaborative Innovation Center of Assessment toward Basic Education Quality, Central China Normal University Branch, Wuhan 430079, China.
⁵ Department of Psychology, University of Turin, 10124 Torino, Italy.

Abstract

Video game addiction, a common behavioral problem among college students, has been more prominent during the COVID-19 pandemic; at the same time, females' video game usage has also attracted considerable research attention. Against this background and under the perspective of social interaction, this study aimed to examine the relationship between relational victimization and video game addiction among female college students, as well as its underlying mechanism-the mediating roles of social anxiety and parasocial relationships with virtual characters. Female college students (N = 437) were recruited to complete a set of questionnaires voluntarily in June 2022. Through the mediating effect analysis, the results found that (1) relational victimization was positively associated with female college students' video game addiction; (2) social anxiety and parasocial relationships with virtual characters could independently mediate this relation; (3) social anxiety and parasocial relationships with virtual characters were also the serial mediators in this association. These findings not only expand previous studies by revealing the social motivation of video game usage and the underlying mechanism accounting for video game addiction, but also provide basis and guidance for the prevention and intervention of video game addiction in the current context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: parasocial relationship; relational victimization; social anxiety; video game addiction.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Anxiety / epidemiology
COVID-19* / epidemiology
Crime Victims*
Female
Humans
Pandemics
Students
Technology Addiction

Grants and funding

This research was funded by the Collaborative Innovation Center of Assessment toward Basic Education Quality at Beijing Normal University, grant number 2022-04-012-BZPK01, 2022-04-031-BZPK01; the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, grant number CCNU22HQ029, and CCNU22QN020; the Key Planning Projects of Education Sciences in Hubei Province, grant number 2022GA008; and the Fujian Provincial Federation of Social Sciences, grant number FJ2020C026.