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Abstract
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We appreciate the attention given to our work “Depression, Anxiety, Stress, and Resilience among the Primary Survivors of Natural Disaster: A Study with Special Reference to Kerala Flood” and the constructive criticism expressed in the letter to the editor titled “Do Natural Disasters Really Have a Significant Effect on a Survivors’ Mental Health?” We welcome the opportunity to address the points raised in connection with our article.
First, the letter mentioned that the article did not specify whether the participants had been diagnosed with mental health issues before the disaster. Since the study was done in the postdisaster phase, preexamining the participants’ mental health status was impossible. Procuring any information regarding the participants’ previous history of mental health issues was difficult, considering the unavailability of data. It is one of the study’s limitations, which has already been mentioned in the article’s discussion section. This is one of the issues with ex post facto designs where manipulation of the independent variable is impossible since the event has already occurred.[1]
Second, the letter mentions that the financial status of the respondents can be a significant determinant of the mental health status of the respondents, pointing out the fact that more than half of the participants have an annual income of <10,000 rupees, hence suggesting the lower financial status as a triggering factor. However, in our study, ANOVA was performed after confirming that the data were normally distributed to find the difference in scores of depression, anxiety, stress, and resilience based on the annual income of the participants. The results mentioned in our article (page number 391) have shown no statistically significant result in the study sample. This indicates that annual income had no statistically significant impact on the mental health or resilience of the respondents. However, we recommend higher-order statistical analysis, such as multiple hierarchical regression while controlling for annual income for future research to comprehend the disaster’s impact on the survivors.
Finally, the letter proposes using a control group comprising individuals from a similar socioeconomic background who did not experience a natural disaster. While we acknowledge that a control
Language: en |