Akciğer kanseri hastalarında travma sonrası gelişim: Sosyal ve bilişsel faktörlerin rolü
Posttraumatic growth in lung cancer patients: The role of social and cognitive factors

Summary/Abstract: Cancer is a physiological disease that poses a significant threat to life. The long-term struggle that begins with the diagnosis of the disease and continues with its treatment and follow-up periods also aggravates the psychological load of the disease. In this context, it is an expected process that cancer has shocking effects on individuals and reveals stress reactions. However, the positive psychological perspective has revealed that negative experiences do not only cause suffering but can also provide some gains for the person. Understanding the factors affecting this positive change, called posttraumatic growth (PTG), has an important value in supporting people who get a second chance in life. For this purpose, this study aimed to examine the posttraumatic growth levels of patients diagnosed with lung cancer with social and cognitive variables. The sample of the study consisted of 90 male lung cancer patients (Mage = 58.18, SDage = 5.82) who applied to the oncology outpatient clinic for health check-ups and whose diagnosed at least 6 months and at most 5 years. In addition to the Posttraumatic Development Scale, the participants completed the Repetitive Thinking Scale and Intolerance of Uncertainty Scale to assess the cognitive factor and the Perceived Social Support Scale to assess the social factor. The findings showed that there was a significant positive correlation between PTG scores and perceived social support and intolerance of uncertainty scores, while the regression analysis revealed that the only variable that had a significant effect on posttraumatic growth was perceived social support. According to the results, it is seen that social processes play a role rather than cognitive processes for post-traumatic development. It is understood that cancer patients' perception of the support received from their social environment during the illness process is critically important for posttraumatic growth.

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