Enhancement or suppression: the impact of social media "fertility fear emotion" on college students' fertility intentions.

OBJECTIVE: The fertility fear emotion spread via social media has gradually become a prevalent social phenomenon. College students constitute the main fertility force in the future, and improving their fertility intentions has become an urgent issue to be addressed. This study aims to explore the impact of social media-induced fertility fear emotion on college students' fertility intentions and reveal its underlying mechanism. METHODS: An online survey was conducted among 1,036 participants using questionnaires including the Social Media Fertility Fear Scale, Fertility Intention Scale, Fertility Attitude Scale, Subjective Norms Scale, and Perceived Behavioral Control Scale. A total of 979 valid responses were collected. Descriptive statistical analysis, correlation analysis, and the Bootstrap method were adopted for data analysis. RESULTS: (1) Fertility fear emotion was significantly negatively correlated with fertility attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and fertility intentions. Fertility intentions were significantly positively correlated with subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and fertility attitudes. (2) Fertility attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control exerted a full mediating effect between social media fertility fear emotion and fertility intentions. There existed a chain mediation effect among the three variables: perceived behavioral control affected subjective norms, which further influenced fertility attitudes. CONCLUSION: Within the framework of the Theory of Planned Behavior, the relationship between social media fertility fear emotion and college students' fertility intentions is mediated by fertility attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control. College students should treat fertility-related information on social media rationally.