Research of the adaptation process of Turkish and foreign students: A qualitive study

The subject of this thesis is; to examine the adaptation process of Turkish and foreign university students to university by using qualitative research methods. In the research, phenomenology design, one of the qualitative research methods, was used to explore the university adaptation experiences of Turkish and foreign students. The importance of this thesis; It is the examination of Turkish and foreign university students' university adaptation processes together. While determining the study group in this study, criterion sampling was chosen from non-probability sampling types. In the study group, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 Turkish and 12 foreign university 2nd and 3rd year students, paying attention to the saturation of the data. In data analysis, Giorgi's phenomenological analysis steps were applied and Maxqda Analytics Pro 20 software was used. As a result of the phenomenological analysis, 5 themes related to university adjustment were obtained. These themes are; "The meaning of adaptation for students", "things done to adapt to university", "factors that facilitate the adaptation process to university", "difficulties encountered in the process of adaptation to university", and "expectations of students in the process of adaptation to university" were determined. As a result of the research, it was seen that the factors that facilitate the adaptation process of Turkish and foreign students to the university are common factors. In addition, it has been determined that Turkish and foreign students have different and common aspects regarding the behaviors of the students to adapt to the university, the difficulties they encounter in the process of adapting to the university, and their expectations for adaptation to the university. Suggestions for the results obtained in the research are given. Keywords: Adaptation to university, the adaptation of foreign students, university students, foreign students, phenomenology