In the process of raising children, Chinese parents often use the shortcomings of their children
to compare with the advantages of others’ children. The purpose of parental upward social comparison
is to encourage adolescents to learn from others, but this kind of behavior may also make adolescents
fall into a negative psychological state and damage their mental health. This study analyzed the influence
mechanism of parental upward social comparison on adolescents’ mental health by reviewing the previous
literature. Parental upward comparison can not only have a direct impact on adolescents’ mental health,
self-esteem, rumination and envy could mediate the association between parental upward comparison
and adolescents’ mental health.