Investigation of the relationship between high school students' empathy skills and parental attitudes in terms of sociodemographic characteristics: Bingol province sample

The main purpose of this research is to examine the empathy skills and parental attitudes of students attending secondary education institutions affiliated to Bingöl Provincial Directorate of National Education in terms of sociodemographic characteristics. The working environment consists of high school, which is affiliated to the Bingöl Provincial Directorate of National Education in the 2022-2023 academic year. The sample of the study consists of 458 students attending high school affiliated to the Bingöl Provincial Directorate of National Education. In the study, answers were sought to the questions of how students' empathy skills and parental attitudes affect various demographic variables such as age, gender, class, number of siblings, educational status of parents, being together with parents, income level of the family and school success status of students attending the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grades of secondary education. It was studied face to face with 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grade students. The analysis of all collected data was done with SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) v26.0, one of the statistical programs. The reliability of the scales used was evaluated with Cronbach's Alpha coefficient. Whether the Toronto Empathy Scale and Parental Attitude Scales differ according to demographic data were analyzed with significance tests. Before deciding which analysis to use, whether the data fit the normal distribution was evaluated by Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Shapiro-Wilk tests. It was determined that the Toronto Empathy Scale and the Parental Attitude Scale fit the normal distribution, and Independent Sample test, One Way ANOVA and Pearson Product-Moment correlation analysis methods were used in the pairwise comparison. Post hoc tests (Bonferroni, LSD, Games Howel) were used to determine the source of the differences that emerged as a result of the ANOVA test. As a result of the statistical analyzes of the research, it is seen that 341 (74.5%) of the students participating in the research were female, 117 (25.5%) were male, 102 (22.3) were 14 years old, 94 (20.5) were 15 years old, 127 (27.7) were 16 years old, 98 (21.4) were 17 years old and 37 (8.1) were 18 years old. Empathy level (average: 51.97 ± 7.93); Democratic ATS (average (x̄) 44.19±6.21); The authoritarian ATS was arithmetic (average(x̄) 26.42±5.26); Protective-Demanding ABQ (average(x̄) 46.70±7.64); It was observed that the total ATS was (average(x̄)117.32±14.52). While significant differences were observed in the students' perceptions of the Toronto empathy scale total according to the variables of gender, age, grade, school success score and number of siblings, no significant differences were observed between the variables of mother's education level, father's education level and parental relationship status. It was found that female participants' scores on the Toronto empathy scale were higher than male participants. (t= 4.994;p=.000 <0.05). While there was no significant difference in the gender, class, number of siblings, mother's education level, father's education level, parents' cohabitation and family income level, there were significant differences in the variables of age and school success score in the students' perceptions of the Democratic sub-dimension scores of ATS. Accordingly, it was found that the perceptions of 15-year-old students were higher than that of 16-year-old students (F=3.25; p=.012<.05). According to the regression results of the study, the model based on the impact of parent and parent attitudes on empathy skills in high school students has been found to be meaningful R2= 0.07 ; p=< 0.004. İn this context, the study found that the constant variable of the study significantly exhausted the skills of democratic attitude empathy, while independent variables of authoritarian, protective attitude, age and brotherhood variables did not significantly.