The relationship between benevolent childhood experiences and depression among Chinese university students: the serial mediating role of family relationships and sleep quality.

Depression represents a significant mental health challenge among university students. Previous studies have revealed a relationship between benevolent childhood experiences (BCEs) and depression, but the roles of family relationships and sleep quality in mediating the link between BCEs and depression remain unclear. This study constructed a serial mediating model to examine whether family relationships and sleep quality mediated the relationship between BCEs and depression among Chinese university students. A total of 1830 university students from 25 universities in three provinces of China got recruited in this study. The assessment utilized the Benevolent Childhood Experiences Scale (BCEs-10) for childhood experiences, the Quality of Family Relationships Scale for family dynamics, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) single-item for sleep quality, and the Center for Epidemiological Survey Depression Scale (CES-D-10) for depression. Correlation analyses and serial mediation modeling were conducted using SPSS 25.0 with PROCESS macro v3.4.1. BCEs, family relationships, and sleep quality scores were all found to be negatively correlated with depression scores (r = -0.46, -0.32, -0.47, respectively, all p < 0.01). Family relationships, and sleep quality scores were positively correlated with BCEs scores (r = 0.31, 0.27, respectively, both p < 0.01). There was a positive correlation between the family relationships score and sleep quality score (r = 0.22, p < 0.01). Mediating analysis indicated that BCEs had a direct effect on depression (the direct effect accounted for 71.54%). Depression was affected by BCEs partly through three different pathways: the mediating role of family relationships (the mediation effect accounted for 8.50%), the mediating role of sleep quality (the mediation effect accounted for 16.40%), and the serial mediating role of both family relationships and sleep quality (the serial mediation effect accounted for 3.56%). The findings of this study demonstrated that family relationships and sleep quality partially mediated the association between BCEs and depression by serial mediating effects.Thus, improving sleep quality and family intervention may be effective measures to protect Chinese university students from depression.