A Study on the Mental Health and Peer Relationships of Left-Behind Children: the Moderating Role of Gender

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6463-750-2_10How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Peer Relationships; Left-Behind Children; Mental Health

Abstract

Objective: To discuss the impact of peer relationships on the mental health of left-behind children in rural areas. Methodology: A survey was conducted among students of 4^th to 7^th grades from five schools in City N and City G, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, using a peer relationship scale and a mental health diagnostic test. Results: 1. Compared to non-left behind children, left-behind children are poorer in mental well-being, prone to anxiety in hypersensitivity tendency, physical symptoms, and impulsive tendency. However, no significant differences were observed in peer acceptance, peer rejection and peer relationships (P> 0.05). 2. Left-behind girls scored lower on peer acceptance than left-behind boys but scored higher on overall mental health and all its eight dimensions, with significant differences (P <0.05). 3. A negative correlation was observed between peer relationships and left-behind children’s mental health. In other words, the more peer acceptance, less peer rejection, and better peer relationship left-behind children perceived, the lower their anxiety levels in the eight dimensions. 4. Gender has a significant moderating effect on peer acceptance and loneliness tendency, with increase in peer acceptance significantly reducing interpersonal anxiety and loneliness tendency among girls (P<0.05). Conclusion: The physical and mental well-being of left-behind children can be enhanced by improving their peer relationships.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Yanmin Zhang
AU  - Yurong Yuan
AU  - Zhen Zhang
AU  - Yan Zhao
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/06/15
TI  - A Study on the Mental Health and Peer Relationships of Left-Behind Children: the Moderating Role of Gender
BT  - Proceedings of the 2025 4th International Conference on Educational Innovation and Multimedia Technology (EIMT 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 106
EP  - 118
SN  - 2667-128X
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-750-2_10
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-750-2_10
ID  - Zhang2025
ER  -