Investigation of decision making skills in football referees in terms of different variables

The aim of this study is to examine the decision-making skills of football referees working in Turkish leagues in terms of some variables. The population of the research consists of approximately 600 people who refereed in Professional leagues in the 2023- 2024 Football Season in theTurkish Football Federation. The sample group of the research consists of 173 Turkish Football Federation referees working in Professional leagues who were randomly selected and took part in the research voluntarily. The Personal Information Form, prepared by the researcher to Access the personal information of the participants, was used as a data collection tool in the study. To determine the participants' decision-making characteristics, the "Melbourne Decision Making Scale", adapted into Turkish by Deniz (2004), was used. The data obtained in the research were analyzed using SPSS 22.0 program. Number, percentage, mean and standard deviation were used as descriptive statistical methods in the evaluation of the data. The t-test was used for comparisons between two independent groups, and the Oneway ANOVA test was used for comparisons between more than two independent groups. After the ANOVA test, the LSD test was used as a complementary post-hoc analysis to determine differences. In conclusion; According to the participants' age, year of arbitration and marital status variables; A significant difference was found in the careful decision-making sub-dimensions. No significant difference was found in any of the subdimensions of the decision-making scale according to the category in which the participants referee, their educational status and their non-referee profession.