Psychological Resilience and Depression during the Covid-19 Pandemic in Turkey

Turkey is one of the countries affected during the period of COVID-19 outbreak. The purpose of the current study is to investigate psychological resilience and depression in individuals during the period of COVID-19 outbreak in Turkey in relation to different variables. The study also aims to explore the relationship between psychological resilience and depression.

The current study was conducted on a total of 518 people over the social media through the Google e-forms. In the study, the "Short Psychological Resilience Scale" and the "Beck Depression Scale" were used to collect data. In the analysis of the collected data, t-test, One Way Anova, Mann-Whitney U Test, Kruskal Wallis-H Test, Pearson Correlation Coefficient were used.

In the current study, psychological resilience and depression were investigated in relation to different variables. Psychological resilience was found to be higher male participants, educators,university graduates and groups with not mental health problems. Depression was found to be higher females, university students, high school and lower graduates,with mental health problems. When the relationship between psychological resilience and depression was investigated, it was found that there is a medium and negative correlation between them. Moreover, the cut-off point for the depression score was set to be 17 and the rate of the people having 17 points or higher scores was found to be 16.6%.

In light of the findings of the current study, it can be suggested to offer more mental health care services to those having higher levels of depression. Studies can be conducted to improve online psychological support services. A medium and negative correlation was found between psychological resilience and depression in the current study, which shows that more importance should be attached to activities to improve psychological resilience.