Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Mental Health in Chinese College Athletes during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Multiple Mediating Effects of Basic Psychological Needs and Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Psychological issues have a complex and multidimensional impact on college athlete’s training performance. As the reserve talent of competitive sports, it is very important to investigate psychological health athletes. This study aims explore association between generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), post-traumatic stress (PTSD), basic needs (BPN), mental (MH) among Chinese athletes who were willing participate in study, had participated national competitions, athlete rating certificate included this study. Participants completed Kessler Distress Scale (K10), Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7), Impact Event Scale-Revised (IES-R), Basic Needs Satisfaction General (BNSG-S). The involved 665 (415 males 250 females), with an average age 20.43 years (SD = 1.68). We performed descriptive statistics, correlation analyses, moderated chain mediation analyses using SPSS 22.0 Hayes’ PROCESS macro. results final model showed that positively correlated (r 0.443, p < 0.001), while PTSD −0.346, 0.001) −0.527, negatively There significant indirect impacts. According bootstrapping results, played mediating role 22.54% 50.29% total effects health, respectively. Meanwhile, effect (7.23%) was also significant. study’s findings advance our understanding connections highlight roles by link