Rentao Zhang’s research while affiliated with Beijing Forestry University and other places

Cyberbullying is a prevalent issue among adolescents. Previous studies have primarily explored the protective effects of the psychosocial factors on adolescent cyberbullying, neglecting the role and potential mechanisms of physical environmental factors, such as nature connectedness. Based on self-determination theory, this research investigated the relationship between both trait and state nature connectedness and adolescent cyberbullying, as well as the potential mediating role of basic psychological needs. Study 1 used a questionnaire survey with 1110 adolescents as participants to explore the association between trait nature connectedness and cyberbullying behavior and underlying mechanisms. Study 2 employed an experimental approach with 73 adolescents as participants to investigate the relationship between state nature connectedness and cyberbullying intentions. The results of these two studies indicated that both trait nature connectedness and state nature connectedness were negatively associated with adolescent cyberbullying. Moreover, basic psychological needs were identified as a partial mediator in the relationship between trait nature connectedness and cyberbullying behavior, while acting as a full mediator in the relationship between state nature connectedness and cyberbullying intentions. This research contributed a theoretical foundation for expanding protective factors against adolescent cyberbullying and provided natural intervention strategies to address this issue.

Introduction Following the conservation of resource theory and natural stress reduction theory, the current study investigated mediated pathways, reverse mediated pathways, and reciprocal pathways between connectedness to nature, depressive symptoms, and adolescent learning burnout via a half‐longitudinal analysis, and discussed gender differences in the three models. Methods Two waves of data were collected in December 2022 (T1) and June 2023 (T2) for this study. The sample consisted of 1092 Chinese adolescents (52.20% girls, Mage = 13.03, SD = 1.43). Semi‐longitudinal analyses were conducted to examine the relationship between connectedness to nature, depressive symptoms, and adolescent academic burnout. Results The results indicated that connectedness to nature can serve as a positive resource to alleviate the levels of depressive symptoms among adolescents and thereby decrease learning burnout. However, the protective effect of connectedness to nature was smaller, and the decreasing effect of learning burnout on connectedness to nature was stronger than the alleviating effect of connectedness to nature on learning burnout. Additionally, the study found that depressive symptoms and academic burnout have a mutually reinforcing effect over time and that the effects of this interaction are more pronounced in females. Conclusions The present study emphasizes the protective role of nature connectedness and the detrimental effects of learning burnout in adolescents.