University Students' Emotions and Hopes as the Predictors of Their Psychological Resilience after Terrorist Attacks

The purpose of this study is to examine whether positive and negative emotions and hope level of university students after the terrorist attacks in Turkey predict their psychological resilience. The participants were selected by using simple random sampling method. Accordingly, a total of 362 students (250 female and 112 male) attending various undergraduate programs at Dokuz Eylul University Buca Education Faculty. The study used Ego-Resiliency Scale, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule and Hope Scale were used as data collection tools. The data collected were analyzed by using stepwise regression analysis. According to the findings, hope and positive emotions are positively significant predictors of psychological resilience of college students after terrorist attacks. These two variables were found to explain 39% of the total variance in the psychological resilience scores of university students. However, the research findings also show that negative emotions are not a significant predictor of psychological resilience.