An investigation of high school students' attitude towards their refugee peers using non-linear principal components analysis

This study aims to measure the attitudes of high school students towards their refugee peers by using Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis. This is because migration and consequently refugees is one of the most important unchanging problems in Turkey and even in the world. The analysis method used in the study reduces and analyzes all data easily and reliably, regardless of whether the available data is continuous or discrete. In order to apply Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis, the only assumption required is that the data are positive integers. This analysis method is free from the limitations of principal component analysis and is more useful in terms of its function, and it is stated through examples in the literature. A total of 562 10th and 11th grade students from Mehmet Akif Ersoy Anatolian High School in İpekyolu district of Van were included in the research sample. While 16 of the variables used in the study consisted of demographic data, the remaining 24 were scale items and consisted of a total of 40 variables. The scale items consist of four factors that examine high school students' attitudes towards their refugee peers, and demographic variables are considered as items that can affect this attitude. The variables were analyzed with the Nonlinear Principal Component Analysis method in the SPSS IBM 22 program and as a result, it was found that children whose parents have lost their lives or whose parents are separated have a negative attitude towards their refugee schoolmates. In addition, it is analyzed that students who are younger than 16 years old and whose positive feelings towards life have not yet been damaged, and students who read between 11-20 books in the last semester have developed highly positive attitudes towards refugee students. As the grade, number of siblings, last semester math grade, age, monthly household income and the number of social media followed decrease, the negativity in students' attitudes towards their refugee peers increases. When the two dimensions obtained as a result of the analysis and reduction are evaluated together, it can be said that the negative attitude towards refugees becomes more pronounced as age, grade, last semester math grade increases and the number of books read in the last semester decreases.