The role of resilience and coping styles in the predicting the psychological symptoms of emerging adults exposed childhood to trauma

The aim of this study is to examine the psychological symptoms of emerging adults in terms of childhood trauma experiences, psychological resilience levels, coping styles and demographic variables. The sample of this research consists of 434 university students studying at universities in Istanbul in the 2023-2024 academic year. Childhood Trauma Scale-33, Brief Symptom Inventory, Brief Psychological Resilience Scale, Stress Coping Styles Scale and Personal Information Form were used to collect data in the study. Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient, Multiple Regression Analysis, MANOVA Test, Independent Samples t-Test and One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and Kruskall Wallis Test were used in data analysis. Psychological symptoms of emerging adults were found to be significantly related to childhood traumas, psychological resilience levels and coping styles. It has been observed that childhood traumas, psychological resilience, and coping styles sub-dimensions significantly predict the psychological symptoms of emerging adults. It was determined that these variables together explained 48% of the total variance of psychological symptoms. It was observed that the order of importance of the predictive variables on psychological symptoms was helpless approach, childhood traumas, psychological resilience, submissive approach, and seeking social support. On the other hand, it was observed that self-confident approach and optimistic approach did not have a significant predictive effect on psychological symptoms. According to the results of the MANOVA test, which examined whether the psychological symptoms, psychological resilience levels and coping styles of emerging adults differ according to whether or not they were exposed to trauma during childhood, the psychological symptoms, psychological resilience levels and coping styles of emerging adults were significantly different according to whether or not they were exposed to trauma during childhood. It was determined that there were different levels of When examined in terms of demographic variables, it was seen that the psychological symptoms of emerging adults did not differ significantly according to the variables of gender, grade level, sibling status, parents' education level, socioeconomic level and paternal history of mental illness. There was a significant difference only according to the variable of maternal mental illness history. In addition, it was observed that there were significant differences between the coping styles sub-dimensions and demographic variables. The results obtained from the research were discussed in the light of the relevant literature.