Işık, Nurten Arslan; Ayran, Gülsün

This study examined acculturative stress and state anxiety among Afghan refugee minors forced to migrate due to war, comparing unaccompanied minors with those who migrated with their parents. The sample comprised 136 participants aged 10–18 years: 77 accompanied and 59 unaccompanied refugee minors. Acculturative stress was measured via the Acculturative Stress Scale, and state anxiety was assessed via the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory for Children (STAIC). Data were collected through face-to-face interviews. The results indicated that unaccompanied refugee minors experienced significantly higher levels of both acculturative stress and state anxiety than their accompanied peers did. These findings underscore the substantial psychological burden associated with migrating without parental support and highlight the importance of implementing targeted, trauma-informed mental health interventions to foster resilience and emotional well-being among unaccompanied refugee minors.

Gülden, Çiğdem; Köroğlu, Mustafa

The lack of standardized diagnostic criteria hinders Internet addiction research by forcing reliance on varied measurement tools. The Internet Addiction Test (IAT) remains the most widely used tool for assessing this construct. This study examined the psychometric properties of the Turkish version of the Internet Addiction Test–Short Form (IAT-7) in a sample of 664 students, including 279 college and 385 high school students from Ankara and Erzincan, Türkiye. The findings supported the unidimensional structure of the IAT-7 in the combined sample, demonstrating strong structural validity and stable factorial representation across adolescent and emerging adult groups. The study findings revealed that internet addiction was positively correlated with smartphone addiction, internet gaming disorder, and difficulties in emotion regulation and negatively correlated with self-compassion among both high school students and college students. In addition, while there was a positive correlation between Internet addiction and loneliness among college students, there was no significant correlation between internet addiction and loneliness among high school students. Multi-group confirmatory factor analysis supported configural and metric invariance and partial scalar invariance across high school and college student samples. Cronbach’s alpha, McDonald’s omega, and test-retest correlation coefficients were computed to evaluate reliability. Overall, the Turkish IAT-7 is a reliable, valid, and culturally appropriate instrument for assessing Internet addiction among adolescents and college students, suitable for correlational, regression, and structural modeling applications in educational and research settings.

Baspinar, Busra

Orthorexia nervosa (ON), characterized by a pathological preoccupation with dietary purity, has been increasingly linked to social media use. This cross-sectional study examined associations between four social media content categories—self-optimization and health, appearance and social comparison, entertainment, and informational and hobby content—and ON tendencies in adults (n = 2,435), using multivariable linear regression and sex-stratified analyses with the ORTO-11. Participants classified as having elevated ON tendency according to the sample-derived threshold (n = 586) were older, more likely to be female, and more highly educated; BMI did not differ between groups. In the fully adjusted model (R²=0.042), self-optimization and health content was the strongest correlate of lower Orto-11 scores (β=−0.45, 95%CI − 0.62 to − 0.28, p < 0.001). Informational and hobby content was also significantly associated with lower scores (β=−0.38, 95%CI − 0.67 to − 0.08, p = 0.013). Appearance-oriented and entertainment content were not independently associated with ON tendencies after adjustment. Sex-stratified analyses showed that the association with self-optimization content was consistent across sexes (males: β=−0.45, p = 0.01; females: β=−0.48, p < 0.001), with no significant sex × content interaction. Effect sizes were negligible (Cliff’s delta:0.006–0.125) and the model explained only 4% of variance, indicating limited practical magnitude. Given the cross-sectional design, causal inference is precluded and reverse causation cannot be excluded. These findings suggest that content type may be more informative than usage duration in characterizing the social media–ON relationship, with health-optimization content emerging as a modest but consistent correlate of ON tendencies across sexes.

Tuncer, Sevinç Köse; Yilmaz, Figen Alp

The postpartum period is a process that negatively affects women’s sexual quality of life. This study was conducted to determine the relationship between depression, the daughter-in-law relationship and sexual quality of life in women in the postpartum period. Cross-sectional study was conducted between August 2021 and August 2022 with face-to-face interviews with 200 postpartum women who applied to family health centers in a province in Turkey. Data were collected with the Personal Information Form, Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, Mother-in-Law/Daughter-in-Law Relationship Scale and Sexual Quality of Life Questionnaire. In the study, it was determined that there was a significant weak negative correlation between the Postnatal Depression, Mother-in-Law/Daughter-in-Law Relationship and Sexual Quality of Life. It was also determined that breastfeeding status, having problems with postpartum sexuality, evaluation of postpartum sexual life, communication with the partner after birth, receiving information about sexuality from postpartum health personnel, and the relationship with the mother-in-law were predictors of the quality of sexual life in women in the postpartum period (p < 0.05). There are many factors that affect the sexual quality of life in women during the postpartum period. Therefore, healthcare personnel can provide psychosocial care and counseling services to enhance women’s sexual quality of life during this time.

Yalçın, İlhan; Boysan, Murat; Eşkisu, Mustafa; Çam, Zekeriya

The aim of the study was to explore the relationships among cyberchondria, fear of COVID-19, health anxiety, obsessions, sleep quality, and negative affect in a national community sample of Turkish participants. A sample of 8,276 volunteers, aged between 18 and 65, were recruited via an online platform. The Perceived Vulnerability about Diseases Questionnaire, Fear of COVID-19 Scale, Cyberchondria Severity Scale, Short Health Anxiety Inventory, Depression Stress Anxiety Scale-21, Obsessive–Compulsive Inventory–Revised, and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index were completed by participants. Data were analyzed using mixture structural equation modelling approach. Results revealed that perceived vulnerability to disease was found to be positively related with cyberchondria, poor sleep quality, health anxiety, and obsessive–compulsive symptoms. Negative affect was positively associated with obsessive–compulsive symptoms, fears of COVID-19, cyberchondria severity, and poor sleep quality. Additionally, fear of COVID-19 was positively related to health anxiety. Also, cyberchondria severity was found to be positively associated with poor sleep quality and obsessive–compulsive symptoms. Mixture analysis classified participants into six latent classes: 1) Risk-Aversive Healthy Group, 2) Incautious Healthy Group, 3) Infection Obsessions Group, 4) Health Anxiety Group, 5) Negative Affect Group, and 6) General Psychopathology Group. The national survey data showed that perceived vulnerability to diseases, negative affect, fear of COVID-19, cyberchondria, health anxiety, obsessive–compulsive symptoms, and sleep quality appeared to be at the center of pandemic health anxiety.

Ağirkan, Murat; Haspolat, Namık Kemal; Çelik, Oğuzhan

This study aimed to examine the different latent profiles of technology addiction in young adults, and the criteria for belonging to these profiles, in relation to sociodemographic factors (gender and SES) and technology use status (daily social network usage time, daily instant messaging usage time, daily online gaming usage time, daily website usage time, and connection location). Data were collected from a sample of 1,431 young adults [988 (69.1%) female, 443 (30.9%) male]. Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) was used to identify the latent profiles, and Multinomial Regression Analysis was employed to examine the relationships between the latent profiles and sociodemographic and technology use. The LPA revealed four latent profiles of technology addiction in young adults: “Non-Addicts (NA)”, “Moderate Technology Addicts-Gamers (MTAG)”, “High Technology Addicts-Non-Gamers (HTANG)”, and “High Technology Addicts-Gamers (HTAG)”. The criteria for belonging to these four profiles were statistically significantly related to sociodemographic and technology use factors, except for connection location, and age. These findings provided further support for our knowledge about planning programs or multi-layered intervention models to prevent technology addiction in young adults.

Işik, Nurten Arslan; Çelik, Gülden Küçükakça; Ayran, Gülsün

The Coronavirus Anxiety Scale (CAS) was developed to differentiate individuals who were functionally impaired by anxiety about COVID-19 from those anxious, but not disabled by their emotional reactions to the disease. The aim of the present study is to validate the Turkish version of the CAS. The study was carried out in two stages. In the first phase, the validity and reliability study of the scale was conducted with 95 people. The single-factor structure of the scale was confirmed with exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis results. Cronbach's alpha internal consistency coefficient was found to be 0.86. In the second stage; the data were collected using the Turkish version of CASand Herth Hope scale. The scales were applied to 720 people. It was determined that there was a statistically significant relationship between total CAS scores and the Herth Hope Index. These findings revealed that the CAS was a valid and reliable measurement tool for evaluating the anxiety levels of individuals.

Fırat, Meryem; Okanlı, Ayşe

This research was conducted to determine the relationship between marital satisfaction experienced by Turkish women and their conflict communication styles. The research also assessed the impact of the descriptive characteristics of women on these variables. The study amassed descriptive and cross-sectional data from May to September 2012, with the sample set consisting of 25,084 married women registered in the Erzincan provincial center of northeastern Turkey. The sample size was set using sampling with a finite population of at least 378 married women by getting p = 0.05, he sampling error of 0.05 and the formula at the limit of 95% confidence level. In practice, it does not stay at the lower limit. The data was collected using the Survey Form, Marriage Life Scale (MLS) and Conflict Communication Scale (CSS) from 418 women living in the city center. The analysis of the data was made with descriptive statistics, t test, Kruskal Wallis, correlation, and variance tests, and the result was statistically significant (p < 0.05). The mean age of women who participated in this study was found to be 35.88 ± 9.23, and the MLS mean score was found to be 34.29 ± 5.10. The mean score of the subscale of expressing feelings was found to be 67.35 ± 8.94, and the mean score of the subscale of close up/avoidance was found to be 63.28 ± 7.90. It was determined that a significant and positive relationship existed between women’s marital satisfaction scores and their expression of feelings (p < 0.05). The mean score of women’s marital satisfaction was generally found at a good level. Therefore, this study identified a relation between women’s marital satisfaction and their styles of conflict.