Peer relationships as a moderator of the effect of grit on hope in a serial mediation model through hope and sports participation motivation predicting sports engagement among Chinese university students

This study explored the potential associations among grit, hope, sports participation motivation, and sports engagement among Chinese university students. Additionally, it examined whether peer relationship might play a moderating role in the indirect pathways between grit and sports engagement. Participants were selected using multistage stratified sampling combined with convenience sampling, resulting in a final sample of 509 college students enrolled in physical education or sports-related programs. Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics 25.0, AMOS 23.0, and the SPSS PROCESS macro 4.2. The analytical procedures included frequency analyses, reliability testing, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, measurement model evaluation, and moderated mediation analysis using PROCESS Model 83. The results revealed two major findings. First, hope, peer relationship, sports participation motivation, and sports engagement were all significantly and positively intercorrelated. In contrast, grit was significantly negatively correlated with peer relationship but positively correlated with hope, sports participation motivation, and sports engagement. Second, peer relationships demonstrated a significant conditional indirect effect in the pathway from grit to sports engagement via hope and participation motivation. Specifically, peer relationships suppressed the positive effect of grit on hope and weakened the indirect pathway leading to engagement. These findings contribute to the theoretical advancement of peer relationship research by highlighting its potential to attenuate, rather than enhance, the motivational processes.