How Does Emotional Abuse Affect Adolescents' Non-suicidal Self-injury Urges? A Moderated Chain Mediation Model

Background: Studying non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) among adolescents has high clinical significance. Its urges have been identified as a potential predictor of NSSI behavior and may serve as a crucial intervention target.

Objective: This study uses a moderated chain mediation model to explore the relationship between emotional abuse and adolescent NSSI urges. Additionally, we examine the mediating roles of ego depletion and self-esteem and the moderating effect of resilience.

Participants And Setting: We recruited 1129 Chinese adolescents (age M = 16.68; SD = 0.78; 49.4 % men) from secondary vocational schools in China.

Methods: We assessed emotional abuse, ego depletion, self-esteem, and NSSI urges in a longitudinal investigation across two time points (T1: March 2023, T2: June 2023).

Results: After controlling for age, sex, NSSI urges and self-esteem at T1, our study validates a moderated chain mediation model and finds that the mediating effect via self-esteem is 0.026 (95%CI = [0.011,0.046]), and the chain mediating effect via ego depletion and self-esteem is 0.031 (95%CI = [0.022,0.045]), whereas the direct effect of emotional abuse T1 on NSSI urges T2 is not significant (DE = 0.082, 95%CI = [-0.002, 0.167]) and the mediating effect via ego depletion is also not significant (IE = -0.003, 95%CI = [-0.022, 0.015]). Resilience moderates the impact of emotional abuse on ego depletion (β = 0.09, p < 0.01).

Conclusions: These findings suggest that ego depletion and self-esteem are potential mechanisms related to emotional abuse and adolescents' NSSI urges, whereas resilience can play a moderating role in reducing ego depletion.