Çocukların büyük ebeveynleri ile etkileşimlerine ilişkin görüşleri

Abstract

Bu araştırma, büyük ebeveynleri ile birlikte yaşayan çocukların, büyük ebeveynleri ile etkileşimlerine ilişkin görüşlerini incelemek amacı ile Ankara’nın Çankaya ilçesine bağlı Beşevler semtinde yaşayan, kolayda örnekleme yöntemi ile seçilen 300 ilköğretim öğrencisi üzerinde yürütülmüştür. Araştırma kapsamına alınan çocukların yarısından fazlası kız, çoğunluğunun yaşı 12 ve üzerindedir. Çocukların yaş gruplarına göre çocuk ve büyük ebeveyn etkileşimine ilişkin görüşleri incelendiğinde küçük yaş grubundaki çocukların büyük ebeveynlere bakış açısının daha olumlu, çocukların yaşları büyüdükçe değerlendirmelerinin daha olumsuz olduğu görülmektedir. Kız çocukları büyük ebeveynleri ile etkileşimlerine yönelik erkeklere göre daha olumlu, erkek çocuklar ise kızlara göre daha olumsuz görüş bildirmişlerdir. Çocukların genç büyük ebeveynler ile daha iyi iletişim kurdukları ve büyük ebeveyne yönelik görüşlerinin daha olumlu olduğu; büyük ebeveynin eğitim düzeyi artıkça çocukların olumlu görüşlerinin ve bazı olumsuz görüşlerinin ortalamalarında artış olduğu belirlenmiştir.

Grandparents/the elderly are the important members of family system (Lussier et al., 2002). Firstly the roles of parents and siblings, secondly the roles of grandparents have an effect on child& #8217; s upbringing and his/her personality development (Anonymous, 2002; Şahin and İnal, 2007). Grandparents influence their grandchildren& #8217; s lives positively with the roles such as nursing, treating with love and affection, making children play games, sermonizing, standing between parents and children and providing for the third generation with the cultural transmission (Şener, 2009; Ç iftç i, 2008; King et al., 2000). The importance of the relationship between grandparent and grandchildren is increasingly recognized nowadays (Smith, 1991). While living with grandparents in the metropolis is getting harder and harder, the tradition of living as a big family still exists in a lot of cities. This tradition is generally seen in the way that with women entering the work life, grandchildren are brought to their grandparents& #8217; houses and within the work hours of women, grandparents take the responsibility of caring children. Establishing a relationship with grandchildren provides a high spiritual satisfaction for grandparents. For grandparents, their grandchildren are more precious than their own children (Hazer, 2011). Having a grandchild is a unique situation for all the grandparents. Spending time with the grandchild, playing with him/her, loving him/her and sometimes helping his/her nursing are uplifting experiences for family elders (Hazer, 2012). A grandparent who interacts with his/her grandchild transfers his/her own culture to the third generation (Ç iftç i, 2008). Grandparents can be more helpful as guides and mentors in many important times of their grandchildren& #8217; s lives than parents (Harper and Levin, 2005). Telling tales to grandchildren, taking them to the parks and entertain them, showing them around are some of the common roles of grandparents (Arpacı and Ersoy, 2008). It is known that grandparents communicate with their grandchildren in a better way and that they can figure as pacifiers, soothers, detractive of tension and conflicts between children and their parents (Ç iftç i, 2008). Understanding each other of different generations which live together and their positive approaches are substantial for social cohesion and peace (Canatan, 2009). On the account that interaction between child and grandparent is significant for the maintenance and protection of social culture and values, reinforcement of intergenerational relations, upbringing and education of child/grandchild, this study is planned and conducted with the aim of analyzing children& #8217; s opinions who are living with their grandparents, about their interactions with their grandparents. The sample of this study comprised of 300 elementary students chosen by the method of convenience sampling who live in the neighborhood of Beşevler from Ç ankaya in Ankara. Questionary form was used as data collection tool. The demographical qualities of children and grandparents were analyzed by the usage of numbers and percentage values. Also, arithmetic mean of variable of age and average monthly income was taken. Positive and negative opinions of the children about the interaction between children and grandparents were evaluated with the answers given to the statements like likert type. The effect of the child& #8217; s age and grandparent& #8217; s age and his/her educational status on the positive and negative opinions of children about interaction between children and grandparents was analyzed by the usage of variance analysis. The effect of children& #8217; s gender on their positive and negative opinions related to the interaction between children and grandparents was analyzed by the usage of student& #8217; s t-test. In cases where the results of unilateral variance analysis were meaningful, to determine in which groups there was the difference, Scheffe Test was used. More than half of the children included in the scope of this study were girls. While the age of most children was 12 and above, almost 80% of them were studying in the 5th grade or in an upper grade. The 47.7 % of the elderly were male. The general average of age was 67.05± 9.53 year. When their educational status were researched, it was determined that 26.0 % of them were illiterate, 44.0 % of them were literate or primary school graduate and 6.0 % of them were high school graduate. Average monthly income of the elderly was & #776; 732.68± 485.752. When according to age groups, the opinions of children about the interaction between children and grandparents were examined, opinions like enjoying time with grandparents, being like friends with grandparents, sometimes loving grandparents more than parents showed meaningful difference (p< 0.05). It was determined that views of the children who were in the group of early age, about grandparents were more positive. It was seen that negative opinions like thinking that communication with grandparents were not sufficient, that grandparents used violence and that grandparents treated other grandchildren differently increased directly proportional with the ages of children. It was observed that children could communicate with younger grandparents in a better way and their opinions about grandparents were more positive. When the mean of the children& #8217; s views such as liking to go to park with grandparents, liking to go to school with grandparents and sometimes loving grandparents more than their parents was investigated, the older the grandparents the averages decreased; the younger the grandparents these averages increased (p< 0.05). The situation of agreeing with the views like thinking that grandparents used violence and that parents interfered in their contact showed statistically significant difference in terms of the educational status of grandparents. It was determined that the higher the educational status of grandparents, the averages of children& #8217; s positive and mostly negative opinions increased. It was seen that girls liked going to park with their grandparents more than boys, girls went to school with their grandparents more often than boys and their grandparents told tales and stories (p< 0.05). The mean of girls who stated that they were given pocket-money was more than the mean of boys who stated the same. The mean of boys who admitted that they sometimes loved their grandparents more than their parents was more than the mean of girls (p< 0.05). It was specified that the mean of boys who indicated that their grandparents were angry with them when they did not do what they asked for, that their grandparents reflected their own negative thoughts about children& #8217; s parents to children, who thought that their grandparents interfered in their watching TV and that their grandparents treated other grandchildren differently from them, was higher than the girls. Old people are an irreplaceable element of Turkish society. They have a highly effective place in education and upbringing of children/grandchildren and development of family relationship (Arpacı ve Ersoy, 2008). Decrease and detachment of mutual interaction between generations lead to the development of controversial values in society. To protect and maintain our social values, improvement of projects which unite together the young and the old/ the child and the old, strengthen intergenerational relations and make transference easy is very important. It will be useful to prepare education programs which convert negative prejudgments of individuals in the society about one another to positive by starting from families, to teach these subjects in mainstream educational environments with mass media and to develop support projects for enabling family members to use positive interaction methods between family members (Hazer, 2012; Canatan, 2008; Arpacı ve Ersoy, 2008). Understanding each other of different generations which live together and their positive approaches are substantial for social cohesion and peace (Canatan, 2009). It is essential to sustain intergenerational communication in a healthy way, to make researches about interaction and communication between child and grandparent in a family for the recovery of family ties, and accordingly to develop solution offers for problems. It is suggested that in the future studies, interactions of grandparents directed to grandchildren and interactions of children directed to grandparents akin by their parents& #8217; sides should be analyzed bidirectionally.