Mindfulness as a moderator of the association between physical activity enjoyment and academic burnout through self-control in Chinese primary school students

Abstract

This study aims to examine the association between physical activity enjoyment and academic burnout, testing the mediating role of self-control and the moderating effect of mindfulness in the mediation model. Participants were drawn from twelve primary schools in China using convenience sampling. The final sample comprised 2,672 primary school students, including 1,304 girls (48.8%), with a mean age of 11.15 (SD = 1.58) years. Descriptive statistics were performed using SPSS, and the moderated mediation model was fit using the lavaan package in R. The results showed that (1) physical activity enjoyment was negatively related to academic burnout; (2) self-control significantly mediated this relationship; (3) mindfulness exerted significant moderating effects in multiple paths in the mediation model. In detail, physical activity enjoyment was positively associated with self-control, which, in turn, was negatively associated with academic burnout. Additionally, mindfulness was associated with stronger associations between physical activity enjoyment and self-control, as well as between physical activity enjoyment and academic burnout, and with a stronger negative association between self-control and academic burnout. The findings suggest that physical activity enjoyment may serve as a protective factor against academic burnout among primary school students, with self-control and mindfulness playing potential roles in this relationship. It shed light on the significance of high-quality, enjoyable physical activities in students’ daily lives and highlighted the importance of incorporating mindfulness into physical education, providing empirical evidence for future intervention designs aimed at reducing academic burnout.