Relationship between college students’ exercise motivation and mental health: Chain mediating effect of perceived social support and resilience

The internal motivation for physical exercise plays an important role in promoting college students’ mental health, but there is little literature on the influence and mechanism of exercise motivation on mental health. We conducted a survey with 1,271 college students who completed the Exercise Motivation Scale, Perceived Social Support Scale, Resilience Scale-10, and General Health Questionnaire. Exercise motivation was found to be positively correlated with mental health. Perceived social support and resilience had both independent and chain mediating effects on the link between exercise motivation and mental health. The results have revealed the mechanism of the relationship between exercise motivation and mental health, and provide a preliminary basis for studying the causal relationship between these variables. Our findings also provide a theoretical basis for developing interventions to promote students’ mental health.