Value Domains of Turkish Adults and University Students

Abstract

The authors identified the basic dimensions of contemporary values among Turkish university students and adults and explored gender and group (adults vs. students) differences in the importance attributed to particular value types. The authors administered a composite value survey to 101 students from different departments of Middle East Technical University and 101 adults from different parts of Ankara. Factor analysis yielded 5 value domains: self-enhancement, tradition-religiosity, universalism, benevolence, and normative patterning, supporting S. H. Schwartz's (1992) motivational value dimensions. Compared with the students, the adults attributed more importance to the tradition-religiosity, normative patterning, and benevolence domains. Gender similarities were more important than gender differences. The results are discussed with reference to the studies of values in the literature and prevalent social change in the social structure of Turkish society.     

Gender Differences in the Perception of Honour Killing in Individualist Versus Collectivistic Cultures: Comparison Between Italy and Turkey

Gender differences in the perception of honour killing were investigated in two countries, both traditionally considered honour cultures but with differing degrees of individualism and collectivism: Italy and Turkey. Ninety-six Turkish undergraduate students attending Istanbul University (40 % males, mean age?=?21.2 years) and 68 Italian undergraduate students attending Turin University (34 % males, mean age?=?24.6 years) filled in a questionnaire which assessed the perception of three honour killing scenarios (scenario 1: alleged adultery, scenario 2: adultery, scenario 3: adultery in flagrante delicto). The questionnaire measured the attribution of assailant and victim responsibility, the proposed punishment for the assailant, and the evaluation of the incidents as crimes. Results showed that regardless gender Turkish participants attributed more responsibility to the victim and less responsibility to the assailant, and proposed less severe punishments than the Italian participants. Moreover, Turkish men attributed less responsibility to the assailant and proposed less severe punishments than Turkish women. Finally, there was an interaction of gender by culture by scenario: Turkish women attributed less responsibility to the victim in the case of alleged adultery, compared to their male counterparts. These results are discussed in terms of the complex interaction between gender roles and the individualist versus collectivist social organization of Italy and Turkey, and the profound social changes that both countries have undergone in recent decades.     

The Bernreuter Personality Inventory as a Measure of Student Adjustment

Abstract

In this study salience, importance, and multidimensional aspects of spontaneous social identities were examined. A Social Identity Survey was developed and administered to an ethnically diverse sample of American undergraduate students. Freely generated, social identities were rank ordered for importance and rated along four conceptually-derived dimensions: emotion, evaluation, importance, and stability. Results showed pattern differences among three groups of highly salient social identities: (a) gender, religion, and ethnicity; (b) academic major and student; and (c) hobbies and athletics. Ethnic differences suggest that mainstream Americans attributed less importance to the gender and ethnic identities in comparison with Asians and Hispanics.     

Organizational commitment,turnover intentions and the influence of cultural values

The moderating influence of idiocentrism and allocentrism on the relationship between organizational commitment and turnover intentions was examined. The investigation evolved over two phases. In Study 1, emic (culture‐specific) items were generated through in‐depth interviews with Turkish employees, and the commitment scales by Meyer, Allen, and Smith (1993) were revised to make them more appropriate for the Turkish context. In Study 2, turnover intentions were predicted as a function of an individual's affective, continuance, normative commitment, and social factors, operationalized as the approval of the family. The results indicated that affective commitment was an important predictor of turnover intentions irrespective of idiocentric or allocentric values. However, normative commitment and social factors were weaker predictors for individuals who endorsed idiocentric, values and social factors were a stronger predictor for allocentrics. These findings underline the importance of a normative perspective on organizational commitment, especially for collectivistic contexts.     

重庆市中学生与其父母价值观的差异研究

从与其父母间具有差异的价值观的角度出发,本研究自编了重庆市中学生价值观量表,并对重庆市的中学生及其家长进行了调查。结果显示:(1)自编的问卷具有良好的信效度;(2)重庆市中学生的价值观具有显著的性别主效应和年级主效应,学校区域和学校类型均不存在主效应;父亲职业、母亲职业在某些维度上存在主效应。(3)中学生与其父母的价值观在多个维度上都存在差异。在六个主因素中,学生最看重自我方面,而家长最看重家庭。次因素中,学生最看重的是家庭气氛、平等、独立和隐私,家长最看重的是家庭气氛、家庭责任、平等、知识价值。     

Gender Differences in the Dimensionality of Social Support1

Although theoretical frameworks have been developed and research has been conducted in the area of social support, little attention has been given to the influence of gender on the dimensionality of social support. In addition, much of the research on social support has been conducted solely with student samples. In the present study, two samples (students, N = 304, and working adults, N = 301) completed a social support questionnaire. The survey instrument measured four types of social support (appraisal, instrumental, informational, and emotional) from four different sources (supervisor, coworker, spouse, and friends). For the student sample, women reported higher levels of social support than men on most dimensions (i.e., 11 of 16 dimensions), with 5 yielding statistically significant differences. For the sample of working adults, men reported higher levels of social support on most of the dimensions (i.e., 10 of 16), with 5 representing statistically significant differences. Differences in results between the two samples are discussed.     

Widowhood and illness: a comparison of social network characteristics in France, Germany, Japan, and the United States.

This study examined social network characteristics of adults aged 70 to 90 years in relation to widowhood and illness in France, Germany, Japan, and the United States. Participants were drawn from representative samples from each of the 4 countries (total N = 1,331). Resource deficit profiles based on whether respondents were widowed, ill, both, or neither were directly related to social network characteristics for German and Japanese adults, were differentially related by gender and age for French adults, and were not related to social networks of Americans. Country, gender, and age differences in total network size, proportion of close network members, and frequency of contact with network members are reported. Similarities and differences found in the associations between normative late-life deficits and social network characteristics in the 4 countries point to the importance of investigating sociocultural factors that mediate the impact of resource loss and afford life quality in very old age.     

Age differences in and correlates of identity status from college through middle adulthood

Adults ranging from 20 to 42 years of age were compared on the Extended Objective Measure of Identity Statuses, a questionnaire measure of identity statuses in the domains of ideological and interpersonal development. As hypothesized, compared to current college students, men and women over 30 years of age showed patterns of more mature identity development in both domains with the exception of foreclosure scores in the interpersonal domain that remained stable. Relationships between life commitments and identity statuses were analyzed separately for adults in their 30s compared to those in their 40s, revealing complex interactions with gender and normative cohort expectations. As hypothesized, relationships between identity statuses and adult commitments were more generally observed for the younger adult cohort, for whom individual differences in psychosocial development rather than age-related expectations might be expected to serve as determinants of early life choices.     

Turkish Social Work Students’ Attitudes Toward Sexuality

The purpose of this research was to determine the attitudes of social work students in Turkey toward sexuality. According to the findings, gender differences, talking about sexuality, and having an active sex life, affect liberality about sexuality. Religious beliefs have a significant impact on attitudes, and our data show that Turkish social work students were relatively sexually inexperienced and conservative. However, they were more accepting and liberal for others’ sexual preferences than for their own.     

Social Safeness and Psychological Vulnerability in Turkish Youth: The Mediating Role of Life Satisfaction

The present study examined whether life satisfaction mediated social safeness and psychological vulnerability in Turkish youth. The participants included 261 university students who completed a questionnaire package that included the Turkish versions of the Social Safeness and Pleasure Scale, the Satisfaction with Life Scale, and the Psychological Vulnerability Scale. To test the proposed mediation model, authors employed hierarchical regressions. Furthermore, the authors tested mediation model using the Sobel Z-test and bootstrapping method to examine any indirect effects. Consistent with our hypotheses, the results indicated that there was a positive relationship between social safeness and life satisfaction, and a negative relationship between social safeness and psychological vulnerability. The results of the Sobel Z-test and bootstrapping revealed that life satisfaction significantly, yet partially, mediated the relationship between social safeness and psychological vulnerability. The findings highlight the importance of life satisfaction in enhancing perceptions of social safeness and decreasing psychological vulnerability among Turkish college students.     

Self-construals and values in different cultural and socioeconomic contexts

In this study the authors investigated (a) how individuational and relational self-orientations, as well as self-directed and other-directed values, are related to one another, and (b) how these self- and value orientations differ across 2 cultural (i.e., 422 Turkish and 441 American university students) and 2 socioeconomic status (SES) groups (i.e., 186 lower SES and 167 upper SES Turkish high school students). Across cross-cultural and SES groups, individuational and relational self-orientations appeared to be not opposite but distinct orientations, as predicted by the Balanced Integration-Differentiation (BID) model (E. O. Imamoglu, 2003). Furthermore, both Turkish and American students with similar self-construal types, as suggested by the BID model, showed similar value orientations, pointing to both cross-cultural similarities and within-cultural diversity. Individuational and relational self-orientations showed weak to moderate associations with the respective value domains of self-directedness and other-directedness, which seemed to represent separate but somewhat positively correlated orientations. In both cross-cultural and SES groups, students tended to be high in both relational and individuational self-orientations; those trends were particularly strong among the Turkish and American women compared with men and among the upper SES Turkish adolescents compared with lower SES adolescents. Results are discussed as contesting the assumptions that regard the individuational and relational orientations as opposites and as supporting the search for invariant aspects of psychological functioning across contexts.     

The Perception of Honour-Related Violence in Female and Male University Students from Morocco,Cameroon and Italy

The study investigates the perception of honour-related violence against women in female and male university students from three countries - Morocco, Cameroon, Italy – all considered honour cultures but different in terms of various other sociocultural factors, such as family structure and gender roles. One hundred fourteen Moroccan (47 females, 67 males), 106 Cameroonian (41 females, 65 males) and 103 Italian (51 females, 52 males) students attending Turin University and currently living in Turin, answered a questionnaire to evaluate an act of honour-related violence by a father against his daughter. The results showed that the perception of this act was influenced by the participants’ nationality: Italians evaluated the incident as more serious and more as a crime than Moroccans, and the latter more than Cameroonians. Furthermore, Italians attributed less responsibility to the victim and more responsibility to the assailant than Moroccans and Cameroonians did; accordingly, they also proposed more severe punishment for the assailant than Moroccans and Cameroonians. The results also showed an interaction between nationality and gender: Cameroonian women attributed more responsibility to the victim and less to the assailant than Cameroonian men, and Italian men attributed less responsibility to the assailant than Italian women. These results are interpreted in terms of the importance attributed to family honour in the three countries and their differences in social organisation and gender roles.     

Values and Corporate Social Responsibility Perceptions of Chinese University Students

The purpose of this study is to analyse the effects of personal demographic factors on Chinese university students’ values and perceptions of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) issues, and to identify the link between personal values and perceptions of CSR. The quantitative data consisted of 980 Chinese university students, and were collected by using a structured self-completion questionnaire. This study found that: 1) the importance of values education should be stressed, because we found that altruistic values associate negatively with perception of CSR, in contrast, egoistic values associate positively; 2) a CSR education programme should be designed accordingly to fit different student characteristics and needs such as gender and major differences; 3) values should be used as criteria for education and recruitment purposes, e.g., we found that female students represent more ethical values than male students, and have a more negative perception of the CSR performance; 4) the importance of environment performance should be recognised by Chinese corporations and policy-makers, because we found that Chinese corporations perform better in economic and social responsibilities than environmental responsibility. It provides an insight of the value structures of Chinese university students and the forces that shape ethical perceptions. It offers a comprehensive study of Chinese companies’ CSR performance, and the results improve the awareness of scholars and managers in solving the current problems and developing their CSR performances further.     

Gender and the Perception of Diversity and Intimidation Among University Students

This study investigated gender differences inthe perceptions of university students about admissionsand curriculum policies around diversity, and theexperience of intimidation. A random sample of 340 students were interviewed by telephone. Theparticipants were 54% male, 46% female; and 18% AfricanAmerican, 5% Hispanic, 19% Asian/Pacific Islanders, and58% Caucasian. The analysis found that more women than men experienced intimidation based ongender, religion, and academic ability, and that much ofthe intimidation is attributed to other students. Womenwere more supportive than men of admissions policies that have social goals. Two sociodemographiccharacteristics (African American, female) wereassociated with support for courses that emphasizecultural diversity among undergraduates. Sexist messagesfrom the broader society communicated by studentsand others in the academic environment and internalizedbywomen — as well as the diffusion effect acrossthe domains of gender, academic ability, and religion— explain the results.     

The Two Faces of Familism: A Cross-Cultural Research in India and Italy

In the present research, we developed a familism scale comprised of two dimensions, namely support obligations and traditional norms, in order to examine cross-cultural and gender differences in a group of Indian (n = 107) and of Italian students (n = 106). We hypothesised and found that support obligations were judged more important than traditional norms in both groups. Moreover, the Indian participants considered both dimensions of familism more important than did their Italian counterparts. Indian women gave greater importance to traditional norms than Indian men did, while Italian women gave greater importance to support obligations than Italian men did. The social implications of cross-cultural and gender differences in familism are discussed.     

Self-reported assertiveness in Swedish and Turkish adolescents: a cross-cultural comparison

The present cross-cultural study compared self-reported assertiveness in 652 Swedish and 654 Turkish high school students by using a multi-dimensional measure called the Scale for Interpersonal Behavior (SIB). Four hypotheses were tested in the study. First, the hypothesis that Swedish adolescents would be more assertive than their Turkish counterparts was supported by the data. Second, the expectation that Turkish boys would be more assertive than Turkish girls, while there would be no differences between Swedish girls and boys, was not confirmed. In general, girls were found to be more skilled than boys in expressing and dealing with personal limitations. Third, as expected, more assertive adolescents in both Sweden and Turkey reported having more friends and receiving more social support than their less assertive peers. Finally, the data supported the expectation that older adolescents would be more assertive than younger ones. The results are discussed in terms of cultural and gender differences.     

Human values and social identities: A study in two collectivist cultures

The current study examines the value correlates of social identities (identification with in‐groups and geospatial units) in two collectivist cultures (Brazil, n = 471; Spain, n = 476). According to previous research, it was expected that subjects who score higher on social values would be more identified with the various traditional in‐groups and with the local geospatial units and that social identities would be predicted by different values among Brazilians and Spaniards. Subjects were undergraduate students (228 males; 719 females), with age ranging from 16 to 55 years (M = 21.9; SD = 4.57), from three states in Brazil (Paraíba, Distrito Federal, and São Paulo) and Spain (Pontevedra, Madrid, and Barcelona). They were administered the Individualism‐CollectivismQuestionnaire, the Basic Value Survey, the In‐group Identification Scale, the Geospatial Identification Scale, and a questionnaire with demographic questions (e.g., gender, age, religious affiliation). Results confirm that importance attributed to social values is correlated with traditional in‐group and local geospatial identification, and that values predicting social identities are different across cultures, especially in the case of values related to geospatial identification. Specifically, among the set of social human values, belonging and tradition were most important to explain social identities. Subjects that assigned more importance to privacy were less identified with traditional ingroups, independently of their national culture. Geospatial identification was based on the values religiosity and belonging for Brazilians, and tradition, social order, honesty, and power for Spaniards. In general, these findings corroborate previous ones, suggesting the existence of a common set of values to explain social identity, based on principally normative values (social order and tradition). Moreover, they indicate the specificity and complexity of the geospatial identification in Spain, where the values of honesty and power contribute to explaining it. In this country, it is possible that the determinants of geospatial identification surpass the social orientation endorsed by people.     

Young people's topography of musical functions: Personal, social and cultural experiences with music across genders and six societies

How can we understand the uses of music in daily life? Music is a universal phenomenon but with significant interindividual and cultural variability. Listeners’ gender and cultural background may influence how and why music is used in daily life. This paper reports the first investigation of a holistic framework and a new measure of music functions (RESPECT‐music) across genders and six diverse cultural samples (students from Germany, Kenya, Mexico, New Zealand, Philippines, and Turkey). Two dimensions underlie the mental representation of music functions. First, music can be used for contemplation or affective functions. Second, music can serve intrapersonal, social, and sociocultural functions. Results reveal that gender differences occur for affective functions, indicating that female listeners use music more for affective functions, i.e., emotional expression, dancing, and cultural identity. Country differences are moderate for social functions (values, social bonding, dancing) and strongest for sociocultural function (cultural identity, family bonding, political attitudes). Cultural values, such as individualism–collectivism and secularism–traditionalism, can help explain cross‐cultural differences in the uses of music. Listeners from more collectivistic cultures use music more frequently for expressing values and cultural identity. Listeners from more secular and individualistic cultures like to dance more. Listeners from more traditional cultures use music more for expressing values and cultural identity, and they bond more frequently with their families over music. The two dimensions of musical functions seem systematically underpinned by listeners’ gender and cultural background. We discuss the uses of music as behavioral expressions of affective and contemplative as well as personal, social, and sociocultural aspects in terms of affect proneness and cultural values.     

Gender Differences in Turkish Undergraduate Students’ Values

The objectives of the present study were to explore gender differences in Turkish students’ values. A total of 231 (125 female, 106 male) undergraduate students from various universities in Ankara (the capital city of Turkey) participated in the study. They were given the Portrait Values Questionnaire along items related to demography. It is predicted that firstly, females would have higher scores on universalism, benevolence and security than males; secondly, males would have higher score on power than females. The results showed that females reported higher levels of hedonism, universalism, benevolence and security than males. The findings were discussed in the light of the relevant literature. The present study can be considered as a contribution to the existing literature on gender-based differences on value priorities by examining a rarely investigated culture—that is, Turkish.