The serial mediating effects of different types of academic stress on depression among high school students: a two-layer protective mechanism based on conservation of resources theory

ObjectiveTo examine theoretically informed association patterns linking different types of academic stress to depression among high school students and to investigate the roles of parent, child communication and self-efficacy within a proposed moderated serial mediation model.MethodsUsing convenience sampling, a cross-sectional survey was conducted among 967 high school students in northwestern China. Measures included four types of academic stress (parental, self-imposed, teacher, and social stress), perceived stress (PSS-14), loneliness (UCLA-LS3), parent, child communication (PACS), self-efficacy (GSES), and depression (KADS-11). A moderated serial mediation model was tested with PROCESS Model 83 and 5,000 bootstrap resamples, specifying perceived stress and loneliness as sequential mediators and parent, child communication and self-efficacy as moderators. An EBICglasso psychometric network analysis was further used to provide supplementary descriptive evidence to support the findings.ResultsAll four types of academic stress were indirectly associated with depression through the serial pathway involving perceived stress and loneliness, with all 95% confidence intervals excluding zero. Self-imposed stress showed the strongest indirect effect (b = 0.036), whereas teacher stress showed the weakest (b = 0.013). Social stress additionally showed a distinctive association with loneliness beyond perceived stress (β = 0.22, p < 0.001), and this indirect effect (b = 0.176) was the largest among all pathways. Parent, child communication significantly attenuated the association between self-imposed stress and perceived stress (β = −0.19, p < 0.001). Self-efficacy significantly attenuated the association between perceived stress and loneliness (β = −0.22, p < 0.001), showing a stronger moderating association than parent, child communication. In the network analysis, perceived stress showed the highest strength and closeness centrality, self-efficacy showed the highest betweenness centrality, and social stress retained a direct edge with loneliness.ConclusionThe findings suggest that different types of academic stress may be linked to adolescent depression through a cognitive, interpersonal pathway involving perceived stress and loneliness. Parent, child communication and self-efficacy may serve as protective factors within this association pattern. These results provide a basis for more targeted interventions for adolescent depression in school contexts.