Views of the children, who are primary school's students in 11-16 age group, about decision making in family

This research has been made at Etimesgut county of Ankara. Aims of the study were as follows; determination of the families views about the children's participation at taking decision process, finding out the effects of the child's age and sex at this subject, proposing necessary suggestions about this subject to the families, investigators and related institutions. Scope of the research includes the all students who were educated at 6th, 7th and 8 th grades of Nasreddin Hoca Primary School and Eryaman Cumhuriyet Primary School, those are the schools of National Education Ministry, were at the Elvanköy and Eryaman regions of Etimesgut county of Ankara. The number of 274 of students of the total 424 students were at the first region (Elvanköy) and 150 of students of the total 424 students were at the second (Eryaman) region. According to age groups at first region of 274 students, 39.8% of the children include in the survey were in 11-12 age group; 51.8% were in 13-14 age group while 9.4% were in 15-16 age group. 47.0% of the children were girls and 53.0% were boys. The percentages of the age groups of 150 students at the second region were as follows; between 1 1 to 12 years of age were 30.7%, between 13 to 14 are 58.0%, between 15 to 16 were 11.3%. 59.3% of the children were girls and 40.7% of the children were boys. Majority of the parents at the first region were graduated from primary school and the majority of the mothers at the second region region were graduated from high school and majority of the fathers of the second region were graduated from university. The income of the families has been found out as follows; majority of the families' revenue at the first region is between 80 to 150 million TL. and majority of the families' income at the second region was more than 400 million TL. At the first region, decisions were taken by the parents and the second region, decisions were taken by the participation of whole family. During the decision making process, not asking the view of the child, not giving the talking right to the child and authoritarian behaviors of the parents led problems in the family. mWhen there were problems in the families about participation of children to the decision making, children showed their reactions with some behaviors like anger, not talking any more and closing of themselves to their rooms. If there are problems like above, usually parents can talk to the child in positive manner but sometimes parents can be angry with them. Selection of the TV programs for watching and the determination of coming and going time of child to house led opinion disagreement at the family. Usually, children took their own decision at buying their dresses outfit. It seems that, at the decisions about the savings, the opinions of the children are not taken into account. About the entertainment decisions, mostly opinion disagreement is seen at going to internet-cafes and friends' meetings. When there was opinion disagreement about decision making, more than half of the both girls and boys reported that a shared decision was taken. Some of the children reported that sometimes a shared decision was taken. It was determined that although most of the children thought child should take some decisions about himself alone, some of the children thought that they should take decisions about themselves with the help of their parents. More than half of the children stated that participating to the family decisions was important. Increase in age was important, since older children find the participating to the decisions more important than the youngers. Children state that participating to the decision making process showed their membership of the family and developes their responsibilities. IV