An Analysis of the Structural Relationships Among Parental Attachment, Basic Psychological Needs, Career Identity and Depression of Chinese College Students in Korea

Abstract

Purpose

Research in the acculturation domain has noted the influence of parental attachment on depression among overseas students. However, an almost negligible effort has been made to investigate how it happens. This study aims to explore the relationship between parental attachment, basic psychological needs, career identity and depression of Chinese overseas students, while focusing on the mechanisms underlying such relationship.

Methods

A total of 335 Chinese overseas students were asked to fill out a questionnaire, and the data of these samples were utilized to test the moderated mediation hypotheses through SPSS and AMOS.

Results

The results indicate that parental attachment of Chinese overseas students has a negative effect on depression, while basic psychological needs play a part in mediating between parental attachment and depression. In addition, career identity moderates the mediating effect of basic psychological needs between parental attachment and depression.

Conclusion

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study has been one of the first attempts to reveal the influence mechanism of basic psychological needs and career identity on the relationship between parental attachment and depression of Chinese overseas students. It is expected that the preliminary findings of this study will encourage more research on the psychological mechanisms of Chinese overseas students, so as to provide a more comprehensive picture of the interaction between parental attachment and depression of overseas students studying in different countries with various backgrounds.

Keywords:

• parental attachment
• basic psychological needs
• career identity
• depression

Ethics Statement and Informed Consent

This study has obtained approval from the Ethical Committee of Sangmyung University and complied with the Declaration of Helsinki. All participants in this study were voluntarily recruited on a compensatory basis with their information kept confidential. The informed consent including the objectives, benefits and risks of participation had been read by participants before the study began, and the data collected would be exclusively used for academic research.

Disclosure

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by Tianjin Center Vocational Education Development Research of China.