The association between physical activity and internet addiction in college students: a serial mediation analysis of interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation difficulties.

PURPOSE: This study examined the association between physical activity and internet addiction among college students and tested the indirect associations of interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation difficulties using a serial mediation model.

METHODS

A cross-sectional online survey was conducted among 677 Chinese college students. Standardized instruments were used to assess physical activity, interoceptive awareness, emotion regulation difficulties, and internet addiction. Descriptive statistics, correlation analyses, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), and serial mediation analyses were performed using SPSS 27.0 and Mplus 8.3. Indirect associations and their confidence intervals were estimated using 5,000 bootstrap resamples. Continuous and nonlinear PA specifications, alternative scoring, and measurement checks were added.

RESULTS

Participants were categorized into low-, moderate-, and high-level physical activity groups. High physical activity, relative to low physical activity, had a negative conditional direct association with internet addiction scores (β = -0.200, p = 0.002). The serial mediation model indicated that high versus low physical activity was positively associated with interoceptive awareness (β = 0.550, p < 0.001) and negatively associated with emotion regulation difficulties (β = -0.287, p < 0.001). Continuous PA was inversely associated with IA scores (B = -2.031 per 1,000 MET-min/week, 95% HC3 CI [-2.431, -1.632]). The categorical serial indirect-association intervals excluded zero under both bootstrap methods; the unadjusted continuous intervals did not clearly do so (B = -0.043; 95% BC CI [-0.103, 0.000]; percentile CI [-0.097, 0.003]).

CONCLUSION

In this cross-sectional study of college students, physical activity was negatively associated with internet addiction, but indirect associations involving the intermediary scores were specification-dependent and limited by measurement weaknesses. While consistent with embodied cognition theory, these findings preclude causal inference regarding directionality, mechanisms, or intervention effects. The results should therefore be interpreted as observational and hypothesis-generating. Longitudinal and experimental studies are needed to clarify temporal and causal relationships.