The mediating role of difficulty in emotion regulation, rumination, impulsivity, and self-compassion in the relationship between psychological symptoms and self-harm behavior

Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) is an important public health problem that affects especially adolescents and young adults. It was estimated that determining sociodemographic and psychological risk factors for NSSI will contribute to development of psychological interventions. When the literature was examined, it was seen that NSSI is an incompatible emotion regulation style and co-occurs many psychological problems. It is stated in the literature that impulsivity and rumination are predisposing factors for NSSI. Although the negative relationship between NSSI and self-compassion has been revealed, there has been no study examining the mediating role of self-compassion in relationship between rumination, impulsivity and NSSI. In this study, it was aimed to examine the mediating roles of impulsivity, rumination, emotion regulation difficulties and self-compassion in the relationship between psychological symptoms and NSSI. 323 undergradute university students were included in the study. Inventory of Statements About Self-Injury, Ruminative Thinking Styles Scale Short Form, Barratt Impulsivity Scale Short Form, Self Compassion Scale, Brief Symptom Inventory and Emotion Dysregulation Scale were used. The data were analyzed using SPSS and AMOS programs. Multiple Variance Analysis (MANOVA), Mediation Analysis and Structural Equation Modeling analysis were carried out for the hypothesis testing. In the path diagram generated based on structural equation modeling, direct paths to psychological symptoms from rumination, difficulty in emotion regulation, impulsivity and self-compassion were found significant. There is a statistically significant relationship between psychological symptoms and rumination, impulsivity and difficulty in emotion regulation, and a negative relationship with self-compassion. On the other hand, direct paths from impulsivity, difficulty in emotion regulation, impulsivity, rumination, and self-compassion to self-harming behavior were not found to be significant. In addition, the indirect path from psychological symptoms to self-harming behavior was not found significant. According to these findings, it was seen that the mediating effects of rumination, self-compassion, impulsivity and difficulty in emotion regulation are not statistically significant in the relationship between self-harming behavior and psychological symptoms.For mediation variable analysis, it was found that both self-compassion and rumination were fully mediating the relationship between emotion regulation difficulty and NSSI. Impulsivity and self-compassion had partial mediating effect on the relationship between rumination and NSSI. The relationship between impuslvity and NSSI was partially mediated by self-compassion. Lastly, psychological symptoms were mediated the relationship between NSSI and rumination.. It can be concluded that the mentioned demographic and psychological risk factors may increase the risk of NSSI and that psychological interventions based on self-compassion may be effective. Conducting intervention-based research on NSSI will shed light on the understanding of this behavior. Keywords: Self-harm, self-compassion, rumination, emotion dysregulation, impulsivity,