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Objective: Hope is defined as having positive expectations about the future, making individuals feel that he/she can overcome negative experiences that may be encountered in the future and affecting mental health positively. In previous studies, it has been suggested that hopelessness levels vary depending on age, gender and culture. In our country, there is a scarcity of studies evaluating hope levels in the general population. For the first time in 2003, the Life Satisfaction Survey measuring objective happiness perception and satisfaction in health, social security, formal education, professional life, personal confidence, justice, transportation services and personal development was performed by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat) and data have been reported annually since then. In the present study, it was aimed to analyze and discuss hope level and factors influencing hope levels and changes over time in data from the TurkStat Life Satisfaction Survey collected between 2010 and 2013 in the light of the literature.
Methods: This study was carried out using the raw data of the Life Satisfaction Surveys conducted in 2010 and 2013 by TurkStat. Overall, 7027 people located in the 2010 survey and 55833 people located in 2013 study were included in the study. Two different models (ordered logit and artificial neural network models) were used, and the obtained results were compared.
Results: When factors influencing the hope level in individuals participating in the Life Satisfaction Survey were assessed according to gender, it was seen that men were more hopeful than women in both 2010 and 2013. When effects of age on hope level were assessed, it was found that there was an increase in the hope level with advancing age in 2010, but no significant effect was found on hope level in 2013. No significant effect of marital status was detected in 2010 while it was seen that married individuals were less hopeful in the 2013 survey. It was seen that employment status and health issues had no significant effect on hope level in 2010, while employees and those with health issues had lower hope levels in 2013. It was found that domestic violence had a significant effect on hope level in both 2010 and 2013. When effects of individuals’ happiness level on the hope level were assessed, it was seen that the level of happiness had no significant effect on the hope level. When level satisfaction from income status was assessed, it was seen that satisfaction from income status had a significant effect on hope level in both surveys.
Conclusion: It was determined that the male gender, presence of domestic violence, state of happiness, satisfaction with income affected the hopelessness levels in both 2010 and 2013. There was an increase in hope level with advancing age in 2010, but there was no such association in 2013. The hopelessness level was higher in married people, employees and those with health issues in 2013 but not in 2010. In this study, it was found that the factors affecting the level of hope varied over the years.