Nila Fadhlia and Disa Sauter together with Bertjan Doosje recently published a paper on adversity, emotion, and resilience among Syrian refugees in the Netherlands.

The qualitative study sought to understand adversity, emotion, and factors contributing to resilience. Although some research has been carried out on factors of refugees’ resilience, there have been few empirical studies on the focus of Syrian refugees. They interviewed eighteen adult Syrian refugees resettled in the Netherlands and used thematic analysis to analyze the findings. They found six primary factors internally and externally promoting participants’ resilience, namely: future orientation, coping strategies, social support, opportunities, religiosity, and cultural identity. In addition, positive emotions constituted a key feature of refugees’ resilience. They identified three positive emotions as highly relevant in the resettlement phase: happiness, hope, and gratitude. Happiness came from feeling accepted by the new society despite their different background. Gratitude and hope were the results of living in a safe country. Furthermore, acceptance from the host society also created hope for our participants.