Return to the New Normal with the Positive Religious Coping and Transformative Power of Suffering After the 2023 Kahramanmaraş Earthquake, Türkiye.

Understanding the factors that minimize or increase the devastating effects of natural disasters on mental health is crucial. The aim of this study is to explore the impact of psychosocial dynamics that are thought to influence the transformative power of the suffering experienced by earthquake victims one year after the 2023 Kahramanmaraş earthquake. The 512 participants directly affected by the consequences of the earthquake were divided into three groups: those who lost relatives in the earthquake (Group 1); those who witnessed a relative being injured in the earthquake (Group 2); and those who had to change only their city due to the earthquake (Group 3). The results showed that individuals in Group 1 and Group 2 had a lower level of transformative power of suffering than individuals in Group 3. However, the differentiation effect of the way of experiencing the earthquake according to the research variables is small. This study showed that positive religious coping positively predicts the transformative power of suffering in adult earthquake survivors and hopelessness has a mediating effect in this relationship. Moreover, the sense of meaninglessness acted as an instigating effect to the predictive effect of hopelessness on the transformative power of suffering. The results also showed that hopelessness became a stronger mediating effect when the sense of meaninglessness was high. Reducing adult earthquake victims' sense of meaninglessness may relatively strengthen the effect of positive religious coping on the transformative power of suffering through hopelessness.