From social exclusion to interpersonal alienation among Chinese college students: the sequential mediating roles of social avoidance and self-disclosure inhibition

Abstract

Abstract

Background Social exclusion—being ignored, rejected, or excluded in social interactions—is a prevalent interpersonal stressor among college students, yet the specific mechanisms linking exclusion to long-term interpersonal difficulties remain poorly understood. Objective This study tested a serial mediation model examining whether social avoidance and self-disclosure inhibition sequentially mediate the association between social exclusion and interpersonal alienation among Chinese college students. Methods A total of 1,166 Chinese college students (64.67% female; M = 20.12, SD = 1.29) completed measures of social exclusion, social avoidance, self-disclosure, and interpersonal alienation. Serial mediation analysis using PROCESS Model 6 with bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals (5,000 resamples) was conducted. Results The model explained 45.4% of the variance in interpersonal alienation. Social exclusion was significantly associated with interpersonal alienation (β = 0.571, p < 0.001). Three significant indirect pathways were identified: a behavioral pathway through social avoidance, a cognitive pathway through self-disclosure inhibition, and a serial pathway from social avoidance to self-disclosure inhibition. The behavioral and cognitive pathways contributed approximately equally, while the serial pathway contributed a smaller but significant portion. Results remained robust after controlling for gender and academic level. Conclusions The findings support a sequential pattern in which social exclusion is associated with behavioral avoidance, which is linked to reduced self-disclosure and greater interpersonal alienation. This pattern suggests that interventions targeting both behavioral avoidance and self-disclosure inhibition may help address exclusion-related interpersonal difficulties among college students.