Peng Zhang,1 Mingliang Wang,1 Lin Ding,1 Jinyang Liu,2 Yuqing Yuan,1 Jianing Zhang,1 Shuyuan Feng,1 Yu Liu3 

1Faculty of Psychology, Tianjin Normal University, Tianjin, 300387, People’s Republic of China; 2College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA; 3Department of Psychology, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua, 321004, People’s Republic of China

Correspondence: Peng Zhang, Faculty of Psychology, Tianjin Normal University, Tianjin, 300387, People’s Republic of China, Email psyzhangpeng@163.com

Purpose:  phone addiction threatens individuals’ physiological, psychological, and social functions, particularly among college students. While existing theories suggest a strong link between self-esteem and phone addiction, the underlying mechanism remains unclear. This study aims to examine the relationship between self-esteem and phone addiction in Chinese college students, exploring the chain mediation effects of online upward social comparison and social anxiety.
Participants and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using an offline questionnaire survey with 789 Chinese college students, employing convenience sampling in Shaanxi Province, China. Four validated instruments were employed: Self-Esteem Scale, Phone Addiction Index, Online Upward Social Comparison Scale, and Social Anxiety Scale. Descriptive analysis, correlation analysis, and mediation testing were performed to analyze the data.
Results: The results showed that self-esteem influences phone addiction through three pathways: (1) self-esteem → online upward social comparison →  phone addiction, with a 95% confidence interval of [− 0.048, − 0.010], indicating a significant mediation effect (effect value = − 0.027, accounting for 14.86% of the total effect); (2) self-esteem → social anxiety →  phone addiction, with a 95% confidence interval of [− 0.182, − 0.106], indicating a significant mediation effect (effect value = − 0.143, accounting for 78.57% of the total effect); (3) self-esteem → online upward social comparison → social anxiety →  phone addiction, with a 95% confidence interval of [− 0.016, − 0.003], suggesting a significant mediation effect (effect value = − 0.009, accounting for 4.95% of the total effect).
Conclusion: These findings indicate that online upward social comparison and social anxiety serially mediate the relationship between self-esteem and phone addiction. The study reveals how self-esteem contributes to phone addiction among college students and provides insights for prevention and intervention strategies.

Keywords: self-esteem, online upward social comparison, social anxiety, phone addiction, college students