Same-Day Associations Between Perceived Stress and Suicidal Ideation Among College Students: The Roles of Social Connectedness and Self-Disgust in a 7-Day Diary Study

Suicidal ideation may fluctuate over short periods, yet cross-sectional or long-interval study designs offer limited insight into day-level variation and same-day associations. This 7-day diary study examined same-day associations among perceived stress, social connectedness, self-disgust, and suicidal ideation in college students, with a particular focus on indirect association patterns involving self-disgust and social connectedness. Sixty-eight Chinese college students were recruited online; 61 provided valid data, yielding 427 daily observations. Multilevel structural equation modeling showed that, at the within-person level, daily perceived stress was associated with higher same-day self-disgust (B = 0.574, SE = 0.065, p < 0.001), which was associated with higher same-day suicidal ideation (B = 0.403, SE = 0.089, p < 0.001). The indirect association through self-disgust was significant (B = 0.232, 95% CI [0.123, 0.341]). Daily perceived stress was also associated with lower same-day social connectedness (B = −0.471, SE = 0.044, p < 0.001), and daily social connectedness was negatively associated with same-day self-disgust (B = −0.503, SE = 0.045, p < 0.001). The serial indirect association was significant (B = 0.081, 95% CI [0.043, 0.118]). These findings highlight a within-person association pattern in which higher daily perceived stress was associated with same-day suicidal ideation in relation to lower social connectedness and higher self-disgust. By contrast, the corresponding indirect associations at the between-person and trait levels were not statistically significant, suggesting that the findings should be interpreted primarily as within-person patterns of same-day associations.