Middle school students' information security and ethical awareness

The purpose of this research is to reveal the level of middle school students' knowledge security and their ethical awareness. First of all, a scale was developed to determine middle school students' information security and their ethical awareness in line with this purpose. Secondly, the Information Security and Ethical Awareness Scale (ISEAS) was applied to uncover middle school students' information security and their ethical awareness by using a screening model. The item pool prepared for developing ISEAS was presented to experts for their opinions, and adjustments were made based on expert evaluations before moving on to the implementation phase. After obtaining the permissions, ISEAS was administered to 621 students studying at middle schools in the central district of Bartın province during the second semester of the 2022-2023 academic year. In the first stage of scale development, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted. As a result of EFA, the scale was found to consist of three sub-dimensions: User Security, Data Security, and Ethics, comprising a total of 17 items. In the second stage, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed, confirming that the scale had a three-factor structure. The calculated Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient for ISEAS was found to be .896. As a result, a valid and reliable scale was developed, and it can be used to determine the level of information security and ethical awareness among middle school students. In the screening phase of the research, a personal information form prepared by the researcher and ISEAS were used to gather information about the independent variables. With the permissions obtained from the Ministry of National Education, a personal information form and scale were administered to 921 students studying at middle schools in the central district of Bartın province during the second semester of the 2022-2023 academic year. In the research, descriptive statistics were calculated for the factor scores of the scale and the total scale score to determine the level of middle school students' information security and their ethical awareness. When comparing two groups, independent samples t-test was used, and for the comparison of more than two groups, a One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was employed. When examining the scores obtained from the scale, it was observed that middle school students had a high level of information security and ethical awareness. The scores from sub-dimensions showed middle school students had a high level of user security awareness and ethical awareness but a moderate level of data security awareness. When considering the scores obtained from the entire scale, no significant difference emerged based on gender. However, when the ethical subscale was examined, it was concluded that girls had a higher level of awareness compared to boys. The participating age groups of 11, 12, 13, and 14 years old were compared among themselves, and it was observed that the awareness level was highest in the 11-year-old group. When comparisons were made according to grade levels, it was found that the awareness of 5th and 6th-grade students was higher than students in other grade levels. The mother's education level was observed not to affect the students' user security and data security sub-dimensions. A significant relationship was found between the mother's education level and students' ethical awareness. The father's education level was observed not to affect the students' data security sub-dimension. However, a significant relationship was found between the father's education level and students' user security awareness and ethical awareness.