Comparative Evaluation of Health Status of Syrian Refugee and Tur CCH_70042 kish Children, Alongside the Factors Influencing Sociocultural Adaptation of Syrian Children in Türkiye.
Filiz Kunuroglu, Demet Vural Yuzbasi, Selma Kaval and 1 others
PMID 39842880WHAT IT FOUND
Syrian refugee children in Türkiye reported higher social anxiety and resilience but lower self-esteem, grades, and worse oral health than Turkish peers.
Across both groups, low socioeconomic status linked to poorer outcomes, while resilience showed no socioeconomic gap.
Key findings
01Syrian children had higher social anxiety and resilience but lower self-esteem than Turkish children, alongside worse academic grades and oral health indicators.
02Low socioeconomic status was associated with higher social anxiety, lower self-esteem, poorer academic performance, and worse oral health in both groups, but resilience did not differ by socioeconomic status.
03Among Syrian children, resilience correlated positively with sociocultural adaptation and negatively with perceived discrimination, social anxiety, and oral health problems.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study is cross-sectional, so it cannot determine whether resilience, adaptation, or health issues cause one another. Participants were recruited from a university dental clinic, which may not represent the wider population of refugee or Turkish children. The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale had low internal consistency (alpha 0.41) for both groups, making the self-esteem results less reliable. The Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents had low reliability for the 'Distress-General' subscale among Syrian participants (alpha 0.59). No imputation was used for missing data, and only complete cases were analyzed.
Declared interests
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret the higher resilience scores in Syrian children as evidence that they are better adapted or healthier. This is a cross-sectional comparison from a dental clinic sample, and the self-esteem measure had poor reliability, so the psychological profile may be unstable.