Objective: Sleep problems and their detrimental effects on adolescents' physical and mental health have received substantial attention. Prior studies have focused mainly on the direct association between sleep and mental health; however, little is known about the underlying mediating mechanism. To address this gap, the present study constructed a chain mediation model to examine the association between sleep deficiency and mental health status in adolescents, by introducing two mediating variables-physical health perception and school adjustment.

Methods: A sample of 7530 senior high school students completed a battery of self-report questionnaires measuring their sleep duration, mental health status, physical health perception, and school adjustment. Data were collected from the Database of Youth Health at Shandong University. All the measures showed good reliability and validity in the present study. Data were analyzed using SPSS 25.0 and the SPSS PROCESS.

Results: The results were as follows: (1) Sleep duration was significantly associated with physical health perception and mental health. (2) Physical health perception partially mediated the association between sleep and mental health. (3) Physical health perception and school adjustment played a chain mediating role between sleep and mental health. In conclusion, sleep not only directly associated with mental health among adolescents, but also influences mental health by the chain mediating effect of perception of physical health and school adjustment.

Conclusion: These findings in the present study contribute to understanding the mechanisms underlying the association between sleep and mental health and have important implications for interventions aimed at improving mental health status among adolescents in China. Our results indicated that promoting adequate sleep duration and improving sleep quality are possible key mental health promotion strategies for adolescents.