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Article History

Received: 21 April 2025

Accepted: 9 March 2026

First Online: 24 March 2026

Competing interests

: The authors declare no competing interests.

: The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Liaoning Normal University (Ethics approval number: LL2025349) on March 10, 2025. This research complies with all relevant ethical guidelines, including the institutional protocols for research involving human participants and the Declaration of Helsinki. The ethics approval covered all aspects of the study, including participant recruitment, data collection, and analysis. All procedures were conducted in line with these regulations to ensure the protection of participants’ rights, confidentiality, and informed consent throughout the research.

: This study obtained written informed consent from all participants between March 20 and March 28, 2025. As the study involved both adolescents and their parents as participants, the informed consent procedure addressed two groups. For parent participants, trained research assistants distributed consent forms and detailed information sheets prior to data collection, providing clear information about the study’s objectives, procedures, potential risks and benefits, data handling practices, and participants’ rights, including the voluntary nature of participation and the right to withdraw at any time without penalty. Parents provided written consent for their own participation in completing the Parental Educational Anxiety Questionnaire, and simultaneously provided parental permission for their children’s participation. Given the involvement of minors, special care was taken to ensure that consent was appropriately secured. Minors received age-appropriate verbal and written explanations to help them understand the study’s purpose and their role. After being given sufficient time to read the materials and ask questions, adolescents signed separate assent forms to confirm their understanding and voluntary agreement to participate. All participants were assured that their anonymity and confidentiality would be strictly protected, with no personally identifiable information collected. The consent covered participation in the study, the use of collected data for research purposes, and permission to publish the findings. As a token of appreciation, participants received a small gift (e.g., a pen or card), regardless of whether they completed the study. This gift was provided solely as a gesture of gratitude, not as an incentive, ensuring the voluntary nature of participation was preserved.