The Relationship Between Depression And Non-suicidal Self-injury In Junior Middle School Students:the Mediating Role Of Difficulties In Emotion Regulation And Its Intervention

Non-suicidal self-injury is considered to be an important global public health problem during adolescence.Domestic epidemiological survey found that the rate of NSSI among middle and high school students was more than 40%.NSSI was not accepted by the society,which affected the physical and mental development of teenagers and increased the risk of suicide.Therefore,the risk of NSSI is great.Emotion,especially negative emotion,is a very important factor in the study of NSSI.Based on the Experiential Avoidance Model(EAM),this study explored the relationship among depression,difficulties in emotion regulation and non-suicidal selfinjury behaviors,and the mediating role of difficulties in emotion regulation between depression and non-suicidal self-injury behaviors.This study includes two sub-studies.In study one,800 junior high school students from a middle school in Jianghan District of Wuhan were investigated by using The Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale,the Adolescent Self-Injury H-Harm Behavior Scale and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation scale to explore the relationship between non-suicidal self-injury behaviors,depression and difficulties in emotion regulation among junior high school students.On the basis of Study 1,Study 2 selected 12 subjects to investigate whether group counseling with the theme of reducing emotional regulation difficulties could reduce the level of non-suicidal self-injury behavior of junior middle school students.The results show that:(1)NSSI of junior middle school students was significantly correlated with depression and difficulty in emotional regulation.(2)Emotional regulation difficulties of junior middle school students play a mediating role between depression and non-suicidal self-injury behaviors.(3)Among the six subdimensions of difficulty in emotional regulation,difficulty in emotional response acceptance,difficulty in target behavior,difficulty in strategy use,and difficulty in impulse control partially mediated the relationship between family depression and self-injury behavior of junior middle school students,while difficulty in emotional awareness and difficulty in understanding had no significant mediating effect between depression and self-injury behavior.(4)The group counseling to improve difficulties in emotion regulation can effectively and significantly reduce members’ difficulties in emotion regulation,and thus reduce the possibility of non-suicidal self-injury behaviors.