Objective: This study examined female college athletes to explore the association between training stress and psychological well-being. It further investigated whether general self-efficacy and psychological resilience mediate this association. Methods: A questionnaire survey was administered to 604 female college athletes. The instruments included the Training Distress Scale, the General Self-Efficacy Scale, the Psychological Resilience Scale, and the Psychological Well-Being Scale. PROCESS Model 6 with 5,000 bootstrap resamples was used to test the serial mediation effects. Results: Training stress was significantly negatively correlated with psychological well-being (r = -0.356, p < 0.001, N = 604). The serial mediation regression analysis showed that training stress significantly and negatively predicted psychological well-being (ß=-0.174, p< 0.001, 95% CI [-0.244, -0.104]). Bootstrap analyses (5,000 resamples) indicated a significant total indirect effect (indirect effect = -0.182, BootSE = 0.025, 95% BootCI [-0.232, -0.133]), accounting for 51.1% of the total effect. Within the total indirect effect, the specific indirect effect via general self-efficacy was -0.084 (46.2% of the total indirect effect, 95% BootCI [-0.125, -0.048]), the specific indirect effect via psychological resilience was -0.065 (35.7, 95% BootCI [-0.101, -0.035]), and the serial indirect effect via general self-efficacy and psychological resilience was -0.033 (18.1, 95% BootCI [-0.049, -0.020]). Conclusion: Training stress significantly undermines psychological well-being in female college athletes. This influence manifests not only as a direct effect but also indirectly through general self-efficacy, psychological resilience, and their chain mediation. Therefore, enhancing general self-efficacy and psychological resilience may be an effective approach to reduce the negative impact of training stress and to promote psychological well-being in female college athletes.
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