The Relationships Between Perceived Social Support And Professional Psychological Help-seeking Attitude In High School Students: The Mediating Effect And Intervention Of Psychological Capital And Personal Growth Initiative

High school students are in a critical period of rapid physical and mental development.The contradiction between physical and mental development,the rapid development of self-consciousness,and the enormous learning pressure faced by high school students can all have a certain impact on their mental health development.Currently,most middle schools in China have set up psychological counseling rooms,which provide good conditions for students’mental health services.However,there are data indicating that high school students have a low utilization rate of the school’s psychological service platform,and many factors hinder their professional psychological help-seeking attitude and behavior.Based on this,this study intends to investigate the influence of perceived social support on high school students’professional psychological help-seeking attitudes,further analyzing the mechanism of psychological capital and personal growth initiative in it,and conduct a group counseling intervention research on this basis,providing a new perspective for the development of mental health education in primary and secondary schools.This study includes two sub-studies.In the first study,a questionnaire survey was conducted among 633 high school students from a middle school in Shantou(with an average age of 15.86 years old and a female proportion of 46.45%)to investigate their professional psychological help-seeking attitude,perceived social support,psychological capital and personal growth initiative.The chain mediation effect analysis was used to investigate the influence of high school students’perceived social support on their professional psychological help-seeking attitude,and the mediating effect and chain mediation effect of psychological capital and personal growth initiative in the relationship between the two.On the basis of the first study,24 high school students(with low levels of psychological capital,personal growth initiative and professional psychological help-seeking attitude)were recruited to participate in the second study,and the subjects were randomly assigned to the experimental group(n=12)and the control group(n=12).The experimental group conducted a four-week group counseling intervention aimed at students’psychological capital and personal growth initiative.The control group was not given any treatment.The effectiveness of group counseling was investigated by t-test and repeated measure ANOVA.The results are as follows:(1)High school students’perceived social support,psychological capital,personal growth initiative and professional psychological help-seeking attitude are above the medium level.(2)There is a significant positively correlation between perceived social support,psychological capital,personal growth initiative and professional psychological help-seeking attitude(r=0.33～0.70,p<0.001).(3)Psychological capital plays a mediating role between perceived social support and professional psychological help-seeking attitudes(the mediating effect was 0.023,the95%confidence interval was 0.0005-0.047,with the mediating effect accounting for15.81%).(4)Personal growth initiative plays a mediating role between perceived social support and professional psychological help-seeking attitudes(the mediating effect was0.005,the 95%confidence interval was 0.0001-0.012,with the mediating effect accounting for 3.29%).(5)Psychological capital and personal growth initiative play a chain mediating role between perceived social support and professional psychological help-seeking attitudes(the chain mediating effect was 0.018,the 95%confidence interval was0.002-0.034,with the mediating effect accounting for 12.18%).(6)Group counseling on psychological capital and personal growth initiative can significantly improve the level of psychological capital(η~2=0.36,p=0.002)and personal growth initiative(η~2=0.37,p=0.002)of high school students,promoting the positive development of their professional psychological help-seeking attitude(η~2=0.43,p<0.001).Finally,this study discusses the main findings,research value,and shortcomings of research methods,points out the future prospects of the research,and puts forward educational suggestions for secondary mental health education.