Predictives of self-compassion in young adults: Perceived social support and childhood traumatic experiences

In this study, it was aimed to examine whether perceived social support and childhood traumatic experiences have a predictive effect on the self-compassion level of young adults. The study group of the research consisted of 474 adult individuals reached via Google Forms. In the study, "Personal Information Form", "Self-Compassion Scale", "Multidimensional Perceived Social Support" and "Childhood Trauma Questionnaire Short Form" were used to collect data from young adults. Independent Sample t-test, One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), Pearson Correlation Coefficient and Hierarchical Regression Analysis methods were used in the analysis of the data obtained. As a result of the analysis, it was concluded that physical abuse, emotional abuse and emotional neglect, which are sub-dimensions of childhood traumatic experiences added to the model in the first step, are significant predictors of self-compassion. When the childhood traumatic experiences were controlled and the perceived social support variable was added to the model, it was concluded that emotional abuse and family support sub-dimensions were significant predictors of self-compassion. With the analysis, it was concluded that the perceived social support and emotional abuse experiences from the family explained 12% of young adults' self-compassion. At the same time, it has been determined that there is a positive and significant relationship between self-compassion and perceived social support a negative relationship, between self-compassion and childhood traumatic experiences, and perceived social support and childhood traumatic experiences. In terms of demographic variables, while self-compassion differs significantly according to age and romantic relationship status; It was determined that there was no significant difference according to gender, number of siblings, educational status and perceived income level. It was determined that the level of perceived social support differed significantly according to the level of perceived income and romantic relationship status. It is among the results obtained that childhood traumatic experiences differ significantly according to the number of siblings and perceived income level.