Investigation of the relationship between social appearance anxiety and perceived social support in patients with burns.

Introduction: Since burns affect body image, they cause appearance anxiety. Interventions designed to reduce appearance anxiety that can cause psychological problems such as depression are important. This study aimed to determine the social appearance anxiety of individuals following burns and the factors affecting it and to examine the relationship between social appearance anxiety and perceived social support.
Methods: This descriptive study was conducted between November 2018 and November 2019 with 106 adult patients with burns. Data were collected using a Personal Information Form, the Social Appearance Anxiety Scale, and the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support. Shapiro-Wilk test, Independent Two Samples T-Test, One Way Analysis of Variance, Duncan's test, Pearson's correlation analysis, multiple linear regression analysis, the Q-Q plot, and the Durbin-Watson statistics were used in data analysis.
Results: The social appearance anxiety scores were moderate (39.38 ± 17.71). Being single; having a high level of education; burns on the face, head, or neck; burn-related amputation; and passing the one-week after injury period were found to significantly increase social appearance anxiety (p < 0.05). Although the perceived social support scores of the individuals with burns were high (68.34 ± 18.08), they were found to have no correlation with social appearance anxiety (p > 0.05).
Conclusions: The results of this study show that social support does not affect social appearance anxiety. In this respect, we recommend that interventions such as reconstruction and professional psychological support initiatives be prioritized for individuals with burn trauma who are evaluated to have high social appearance anxiety by the appearance anxiety scales.
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