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Witnessing Interparental Violence and Adolescents’ Non-Suicidal Self-Injury: Differential Mediating Roles of Presence of Meaning and Search for Meaning

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: Most prior research on adolescents’ exposure to interparental violence has focused on externalizing outcomes such as aggressive behavior, whereas relatively little attention has been given to NSSI. This study aimed to examine the association between witnessing interparental violence and adolescents’ non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) by exploring the mediating roles of presence of meaning and search for meaning and examining gender as a potential moderator in an exploratory manner. Data were collected from 1673 adolescents (Mage at Time 1 = 13.14 years, SD = 0.78; 48.12% girls) recruited from three public junior high schools in China. Participants completed measures of witnessing interparental violence, meaning in life, and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) across three waves at six-month intervals. Results indicated that witnessing mother-to-father violence (WMFV) at Time 1 had a significant total effect on NSSI at Time 3, whereas witnessing father-to-mother violence (WFFV) at Time 1 had a marginally significant total effect, after controlling for gender, age, socioeconomic status (SES), and baseline NSSI. After presence of meaning (ML-P) and search for meaning (ML-S) were included as mediators, only ML-P, and not ML-S, significantly mediated these associations. The exploratory analysis of gender moderation did not reveal significant gender differences in these associations. These findings suggest that ML-P may be one pathway linking witnessing interparental violence to NSSI among adolescents. Given the observational design, causal inferences cannot be drawn. Nevertheless, the results are consistent with the view that preventing interparental violence and supporting adolescents’ sense of meaning may be relevant for reducing NSSI risk, and these possibilities warrant further investigation.

Source: Behavioral Sciences

DOI: 10.3390/bs16101866

Authors: Xiujuan Wu, Keyao Wang, Yaru Shi, Xun Zhou

Institution: Huaibei Normal University

Language: English

Topic: Suicide and Self-Harm Studies

Subfield: Clinical Psychology

Field: Psychology

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Good health and well-being, Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,654