A study on determining the differences between generations on the awareness of ceremonial meals: The sample of Afyonkarahisar

As part of the tradition in Afyonkarahisar, which has a rich culinary culture and variety of food, birth, death, circumcision, marriage etc. ceremonial dinners are organized on special occasions. In this study, it was aimed to determine the differences between generations. For this purpose, baby boom generation living in Afyonkarahisar, X, Y and Z generations, which were born between 1945 and 1995 were determined as the population of the study. The sample consisting of 398 people determined by random sampling method was reached in between November and December of 2018; in January 2019 also and data were collected by using questionnaire as data collection technique. In this study, demographic and some individual characteristics of the participants are presented with frequency and percentage distributions. Shapiro-Wilk and Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests were conducted to determine whether the scale and dimensions used in the study were normally distributed or not. Because of the normal distribution of the scales, two independent parametrical group T-test and One-way Anova analysis were used. As a result of the analyzes, the ceremonies where the participants attended the most were circumcised, wedding and feast dinners, while the most attended was the dinner, wandering and teething dinner, the most famous dishes were tavuklu pilav, etli pilav, bükme, bişi, sütlaç, üzüm-vişne hoşafı, the least known and tasted the ceremonial dishes of kedi külümbe, maydonoz musakka, palize and duvaklı hindi was determined. It was determined that there was a statistically significant difference between the participants' gender, marital status, educational status, income status, profession, living duration in Afyonkarahisar and their knowledge about ceremonial meals. As the generations change, there is also a decrease in the awareness of ceremonial dishes, and it is seen that the dishes served frequently in ceremonies are more known, while in the time it is no longer a ceremonial meal, or it is seen that the dishes served in the ceremony are less known day by day.