Open Access

ARTICLE

The Relationship between Rural Left-Behind Children’s Physical Activity and Hope: The Mediating Effects of Perceived Social Support

Menglong Li^*, Yujia Ren

Hunan First Normal University, Changsha, 410205, China

* Corresponding Author: Menglong Li. Email:

International Journal of Mental Health Promotion 2023, 25(9), 1033-1039. https://doi.org/10.32604/ijmhp.2023.028243

Received 06 December 2022; Accepted 03 March 2023; Issue published 10 August 2023

Abstract

It has been confirmed in previous studies that there is a positive correlation between physical activity and hope. In this study, rural left-behind children in China was taken as the participants to investigate the impact of physical activity on hope in rural left-behind children and examine the mediating role of perceived social support in the relationship between physical activity and hope. 797 valid copies of the questionnaire were collected from China. Pearson correlation coefficient was employed to analyze the relationship between physical activity and hope; SEM and Bootstrap were used to test the mediating effect of perceived social support. The results show that physical activity can not only directly and positively predict the level of hope in rural left-behind children but can also predict the level of hope through perceived social support; perceived social support plays a mediating role in the relationship between physical activity and hope. These results highlight the necessity to pay more attention to the physical activity of left-behind children and the possibility to improve the level of hope by increasing their physical activity; at the same time, the acquisition of more material, emotional and psychological support from teachers and guardians is more conducive to improving the sense of hope in left-behind children. These findings can deepen the understanding of the sense of hope in left-behind children, and provide new methods for and enlightenments on improving the level of hope in left-behind children.

---

Keywords

---