Investigation of non-suicidal self-injury, self-concealment and perfectionism among university students

This study aimed to examine non-suicidal self-injury, self-concealment and perfectionism in university students. Sociodemographic Information Form, Inventory of Statements About Self Injury, Self-Concealment Scale and Perfectionism Cognitions Inventory were used in the research. Data for the research was obtained online. The data obtained was analyzed with the SPSS 22 package program. Data were analyzed using Chi-Square and Mann-Whitney U tests, Pearson Correlation analysis and Multiple Regression analysis. The research in the purposeful and convenient sampling method was used. In the first stage, 600 university students over the age of 18 studying at university students in Turkey were reached. In the second stage, 203 university students who have committed self-injury at least once constitute the sample group. The frequency of self-injury behavior is 33%. Of the university students between the ages of 18-27 who injured themselves, 72.4% are female and 27.6% are male. It has been observed that the most preferred types of self-injury behavior are preventing the wound from healing, hitting oneself against a hard place or hitting oneself and bit, respectively. A significant difference was found in cutting, rubbing the skin on a hard surface and burning according to gender. The number of women is higher in all other behaviors except burning. Among the self-injury behavior functions, autonomous functions were preferred more frequently than social functions. Among the autonomous functions, the emotion regulation function is the most preferred function. It has been found that the endurance function is the most among social functions. A significant difference was found between genders in interpersonal boundary, sensation seeking, autonomy and peer bond functions. Whether the participants felt pain during the self-injury behavior, whether they were alone or not, acting according to the urge to injure, and between genders; between wanting or not wanting to end the behavior and getting psychological support; It was determined that there was no significant difference between the number of self-injury behaviors they preferred and their socioeconomic status. It has been observed that self-injury behavior has a positive and significant relationship with total, autonomous and social functions and self-concealment. While self-injury behavior was found to have a positive significant relationship with total and autonomous functions and perfectionism, it was observed that there was a positive and insignificant relationship between social functions and perfectionism. It was also found that there was a significant positive relationship between self-concealment and perfectionism. Along with all these, the effect of self-concealment and perfectionism on self-injury was examined. As a result of this examination, it was found that the variables explained 10% of self-injury and self-concealment was a more significant predictor. When the effects of the variables were examined separately, it was seen that they were predictive of self-injury. With is, it has been found that self-concealment has a separate effect on self-injury behavior and autonomous and social functions. Keywords: Self-concealment, self-injury, perfectionism, university students