Determination of Bioethical Perceptions of Gifted Students

Abstract

This research was carried out to reveal the bioethical values that special, talented students have about the socioscientific issues that they may encounter in everyday life. Scanning model was used in the research from quantitative research methods. The study's working group is composed of special talented fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth-grade students (N = 100) who have already been diagnosed with a special talent individual in the 2017-2018 academic year and who continue to science and art centers. The Bioethics Value Inventory developed by Kurt (2011) was used as a data collection tool. The inventory consists of five scenarios and contains frequently encountered dilemmas. Scenario issues include active and passive euthanasia, organ donation, GMO products, embryology technologies. In the analysis of the data, descriptive statistics were used for the answers given by the students to the script. Besides, Chi-square test was applied by SPSS package program to determine whether there is a difference in bioethical value and main decision options according to gender, grade level, mother education level and father education level. According to the scenario in the inventory, the students' ethical values (The Utilitarian, The rights, The justice, The virtue, The normative, The theological, preference for natural, The science and technology-based, Belief in Humans' Superiority to Other Living Beings) were calculated by calculating percentages. There are various outcomes in the Chi-square test for each scenario. Despite the fact that private/gifted individuals are few in the society, they need to develop their ethical values, especially when considering the contribution each country can make. For this reason, the ethical values of special, talented individuals should first be identified in their current bioethics, and then the bioethical value education should be given to the privatized programs directed to them. Nowadays, with the emphasis on bioethics education, it is expected that the study will be a source of many kinds of researchers on bioethics education of specially talented children. The study is becoming important in these aspects.