Childhood psychological abuse and neglect to vocational college freshmen' mental health:Mediating roles of self-esteem and neuroticism

Objective:To explore the relationship of vocational college freshmen' mental health with neuroticism,self-esteem,childhood psychological abuse and neglect,and validate that by structure equation modeling.Methods:A convenient sample of 740 freshmen from a certain vocational college of Hunan Province were surveyed with the SeIf-Esteem Scale(SES),Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-neuroticism(EPQ-N),Child Psychological Abuse and Neglect Scale(CPANS),and Symptom Checklist 90(SCL-90).Results:Childhood psychological abuse and neglect had significant direct effect on vocational college students' mental health,neuroticism,and self-esteem(β=0.18,-0.36,-0.39;Ps0.001).Neuroticism and self-esteem had significant direct effect on mental health(β=-0.66,-0.18;Ps0.001).Results of the multivariate delta method indicated that both neuroticism and self-esteem served as a partial mediator of the relation between childhood psychological abuse and neglect and vocational college students' mental health(z=25.81,9.84;Ps0.01).Conclusion: The effects of vocational college students' neuroticism,self-esteem and childhood psychological abuse and neglect on mental health have been supported in this study.The mediating roles of self-esteem and neuroticism suggest salient leverage points for change through self-esteem enhancement and emotion management in vocational college students.