Investigating the effect of nonviolence education program on high school students' aggressiveness tendencies, empathy levels and perceptions related to nonviolence

In this research, the effect of nonviolence education program on high school students? aggressiveness tendencies, empathy levels and perceptions related to nonviolence have been investigated.The research was carried out with the participation of nineth grade students who are registered at 2011 ? 2012 academic year in Ovakent High School and Kaymakçı High School Pretest ? posttest control group quasiexperimental design has been used in the research. All the ninth grade classes of Ovakent High School were selected as the experiment group while all the ninth grade classes of Kaymakçı High School were selected as the control group.Nonviolence education program which is composed of twenty five sessions were aplied to the experiment group two hours in a week. Both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods were used together in the research. Before and after experimental treament, Aggression Scale and KA-Sİ Empathic Tendency Scale have been applied to exper-iment and control groups. Moreover, in order to investigate the perceptions of nonviolence of the students in the experiment group, a semi-structured interview form prepared by the re-searcher has also been applied.When the findings of the research were examined, it has seen that nonviolence educa-tion program is effective in decreasing the aggressive tendencies and increasing the empathy levels of the ninth grade high school students. In the interviews carried out with the students; it has been found that students gained awareness of violence, its? causes and negative effects, concept and ingredients of nonviolence, and nonviolent and constructive conflict resolution skills.