Values Education Research Trends in Turkey: A Content Analysis

Abstract

The present study makes a situation analysis of graduate theses on values education published between 1999 and 2015 in Turkey. It has a qualitative research design, wherein data is collected through document analysis. The form developed for this purpose is comprised of nine sections, each of which focuses on a different aspect: universities, education levels, departments/programs, topics, research models, methodologies, sampling strategies, data collection instruments, and data analysis techniques. A total of 126 graduate theses were analyzed. The data was analyzed by means of content analysis. The study revealed that, of 126 theses, 106 were master’s theses, and 20 were doctoral theses; the highest number of theses on values education were submitted in 2013, and the most frequently studied topic was students’ values. It was also found that qualitative methods were the most common research methods, and survey was the most common research model. Finally, random sampling was found to be the most common sampling technique.