Cell phone addiction and sleep disturbance among medical students in Jiangsu Province, China: the mediating role of psychological resilience and the moderating role of gender

Abstract

BackgroundCell phone addiction presents a widespread and severe physical and mental health concern, now recognized as a global public health issue. Among medical college students, the issue of poor sleep quality has become particularly prevalent. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between cell phone addiction and sleep disturbance in a population of medical college students, exploring the potential mediating role of psychological resilience and the moderating impact of gender.MethodsA random cluster sampling method was employed to survey 5,048 students from four medical colleges in Jiangsu Province, China, utilizing the Mobile Phone Addiction Index (MPAI), Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC), and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) for data collection. Statistical analyses were conducted using SPSS 26.0 and the PROCESS macro version 4.1. To assess mediation, Model 4 of the PROCESS macro was utilized, while Model 15 was employed to investigate the moderating effect of gender.ResultsThe results revealed a significant positive correlation between cell phone addiction and sleep disturbance, with psychological resilience found to partially mediate this relationship. Moreover, gender was observed to significantly moderate the impact of cell phone addiction on sleep disturbance. Specifically, bootstrap analysis indicated a significant interaction between cell phone addiction and gender (Coeff. = -0.0215, P< 0.001), with a stronger relationship found in males (simple slope = 0.0616, t = 16.66, P< 0.001) compared to females (simple slope = 0.0401, t = 9.51, P< 0.001).ConclusionUltimately, psychological resilience was identified as a partial mediator between cell phone addiction and sleep disturbance in medical students from Jiangsu Province, with gender playing a significant moderating role in this association.