The effect of socio-economic level on children's reading habits: A research on eighth grade students in Ankara

Reading is a skill that is developed over the years as a skill acquired in childhood and that becomes a habit when done regularly and continuously. It can be said that the most important factors in acquiring reading habits, which are known to be very important in terms of individual and social development, are primarily family, school teachers and libraries. Socio-economic factors directly affect the components of this process. Factors such as the education and income level of the child's parents and their professions which define their socio-economic status , the characteristics of the schools where they receive education and the environment in which they live can vary according to the socioeconomic background, all of which closely affect reading habits. In this respect, researching children's reading habits in the context of socio-economic factors and the results will contribute greatly to the applications for solving the problem of poor reading habits. In this study, the reading habits of eighth grade students living in different socioeconomic conditions in Ankara have been examined on the basis of socio-economic features such as family income level, education level of parents, their occupations and geographical origin. The universe of the research consists of 8th grade students in secondary schools located in 3 districts within the borders of the City of Ankara. The research, which was sampled with 3 districts, 8 secondary schools, 256 students, was carried out with the descriptive method, and the survey technique was used to collect the data. According to the results obtained from the research, there are significant relationships between the socio-economic characteristics determined as the income level, the education level of the parents , their occupations and geographical origins and the reading habits of the students. Those with strong reading habits are mostly from households with middle and lower-middle income , middle-level readers come from families having upper and upper-middle income , and weak-level readers are mostly viii raised in lower and lower-middle income households . The socio-economic features with the strongest relationship with students' reading habits are "income level", "education" and "occupation", whereas the socio-economic feature with the weakest relationship is "geographical origin". Based on the findings obtained, the research hypothesis, which was set as "The level of reading habits of eighth grade primary school students in Ankara varies according to their socio-economic characteristics" was confirmed. Key Words Primary school students, Reading habits, Reading culture, Socio-economic characteristics, Socio-economic determinants , Ankara