A study of perceived family functions of secondary school students whose parents divorced, in terms of some variables

In this study, the purpose was to examine the family functions of the students whose parents are divorced, in terms of some variables. In the study arranged as appropriate to scanning model, the Family Assessment Device adapted to Turkish by Bulut (1990) has been used in order to assess the students? perceptions with regard to family functions, and also Personal Information Form prepared by the researcher to collect data for the independent variables of the research.The population of the study is the students of divorced parents in public secondary schools of Fatih district in Istanbul in 2011-2012 academic years. The sample of the research consists of 151 students whose parents are divorced,In the data analysis, independent sample t test and one ANOVA have been applied for parametric distributions and in the cases when ANOVA analyses have been significant, Scheffe test has been applied for homogeneous variations and Tamhane?s T2 test for non-homogeneous ones. And also Kruskall Wallis H test has been applied for non-parametric distributions and in the cases when Kruskall Wallis H test has been significant, Mann Whitney-U test has been applied.According to the findings of the study, it has been observed that the students whose parents are divorced have unhealthy perceptions of family functions in the dimensions of communication and affective responsiveness, while they perceive the rest of the dimensions of family functions healthy. However, when the family functions have been evaluated in terms of marital status, it has been observed that the students whose parents are divorced have more unhealthy perceptions of following dimensions: communication, affective responsiveness, affective involvement and general family functions than the students whose parents are married.The findings of the study indicates that the family functions the students of divorced parents perceive do not vary significantly with regard to the variables from the birth order, number of siblings, family structure, age group in the course of divorcing and the person notifying the child about the divorcement, on the other hand, that they vary significantly considering the variables that are gender, age, educational level of parents, their profession, their presence or absence of life, perceived income level, that how many years ago they divorced, informing the child about divorcement, the person the child is living with, that how frequently the child sees the parent who has left, and perceived parents attitudes.Keywords: Family, Family Functions, Divorce, Secondary School