THE ANALYSIS OF THE INQUERY (TURKEY)

In today’s world, in which the boundaries of countries are diappearing day by day, the necessity of the consciousness about the topic “gender stereotypes within the society” is one of the most indispensible issues for ensuring the quality, as well as equality, in a Wuropean scope. The matter of “gender stereotypes” is among the major obstacles endangering the idea of equality between the genders in every aspects of life. Since this is the way it is, within the project ESHA we are trying to define the gender stereotypes in society, to compare the various types of definition according to the countries in cooperation, as well as to fight the effects of it which prevents the individuals from doing what they really want to do while also trying to find some solutions.

The Methodology

Moving with the idea that the best way to find effective methods of defining the gender stereotypes is to consult the ideas of the first hand sources- the individulas, the research is mainly based on the questionnaire designed to measure the views on how they perceive the roles of both genders within family, education and work life, that’s in social life in general.

The Research Subjects of Turkey

Since the results of the questionnaire must reflect the general idea of Turkey on gender stereotypes, the participants were elaborated in a way that they represent different parts of Turkey so as to get a satisfactory result. So as to achieve that the subjects were mainly young students from the departments of Blacksea Technical University, whose students come from different regions of Turkey. These students joined the inquery volunteerly as representatives of their regions so as to achieve a general data rather than a regional one. The rest of the participants are the citizens of Trabzon who are at different ages.

During the application of the inquery, we consulted the ideas of 100 subjects 38 of whom are male and 62 of whom are female. 47 % of the participants are at the age of betwwen 18-24, which means almost half of the ideas are of group of young people. The rest is divided in almost equal parts until the ages of 54 and only 2% of the ideas are of the people older than 55.

The data

The adjectives suited to each gender

At work

(the adjectives overwhelming for any gender are given in bold, the similar answers are underlined)

Table I.

man / woman / both
Organizing / 36 / 25 / 39
Clever / 32 / 43 / 25
Dynamic / 37 / 36 / 27
Egoist / 33 / 37 / 30
Hardworking / 26 / 51 / 23
Creative / 17 / 60 / 23
Communicative / 5 / 79 / 16

The Table I indicates the data concerning the adjectives suited to man, woman or both in work place. Looking at the results, it can be said that while the adjectives “organizing”, “dynamic”, “egoist” used almost equally for the three groups, the women are overwhelming with the adjectives suited for their gender such as “clever”, “hardworking”, “creative” and “communicative”, which shows thatmore than half of the participants think that women are better in such skills at work.

In family life

Table II.

man / woman / both
Protective / 25 / 26 / 49
Waster / 28 / 38 / 34
Affectionate / 8 / 64 / 28
Patient / 12 / 68 / 20
Breadwinner / 57 / 8 / 35
Responsible / 17 / 44 / 39

The table above shows the results related to family life. Being “protective” is regarged as a duty which must be shared among both genders. Looking at the answers it’s seen that 49% of the sujects (which is almost half) see that adjective suited to both genders. Similarly, 25% think that man is pretective within family while 26% regard woman as a source of protection in family. The adjectives “waster”, “affectionate”, “patient” and “responsible” are most used for women while the only adjective “breadwinner” is suited to man with a percentage of 57.

Gender Relations

Table III.

man / woman / both
Sensitive / 15 / 61 / 24
Romantic / 10 / 59 / 31
Frivolous / 35 / 31 / 34
Pessimist / 27 / 42 / 31
Naive / 24 / 52 / 24
Realist / 64 / 25 / 11
Faithless / 39 / 30 / 31
Erotic / 11 / 51 / 38
Jealous / 25 / 32 / 43
Charming / 9 / 76 / 15

As it’s seen in the Table III., women are leading in the adjectives like “sensitive”,“romantic”, “pessimist”, “naive”,“erotic” and “charming”, which can be the evidence of that women are more intense when it comes to the matter of gender relations. With a percentage of 76, they are the greatest contributors of the phsical appearance of any relationship. However, with the 64%, men are considered to be more realistic in gender relations, a situation which is sometimes regarded -by women- as “just having a relationship” rather than “being really in love”. According to the part of being “faithless”, even if the men have a slightly more rate, both genders share the total amount. There is no big difference concerning loyalty one another. Similarly, in the issue of jealousy, as well as being frivolousmen and women indicate similar results.

If you had to hire an employee, whom would you choose first?

Table IV.

man / Woman / both
12 / 48 / 34

As one of the results of the questionnaire, the answer to the question above is a distinctive one in terms of employment. It’s also surprisingly in conradiction with the general supposition. 48% of the subjects prefer women employees to male ones while only 12% prefers male employees. 34 of the participants stay nötr in the matter of choosing an employee according to his/her gender.

The Matter of Gender in Secondary Education

Table V.

man teacher / woman teacher / both
History / 38 / 30 / 32
Native Language - Literature / 6 / 68 / 26
Mathematics / 65 / 11 / 24
Sciences / 61 / 14 / 25
Foreign languages / 11 / 56 / 31
Computer science / 55 / 6 / 39

The Table V. shows the subjects' choice of the gender of the teacher of different branches. Looking at the table, it’s seen that that the majority of the subjects match the figure of “female teacher”in their minds with the subjects like native language, literature and foreign language. Those who do this type of matching constitute the 68% of the participants for native language and literature and the 56%for foreign language teaching. However, with the percentages of 65 and 61, as well as 55, more than half of the subjects taking part in the questionnaire preferred a male teacher in such lessons which are more numeric and scientific. The first spot of the table, which is about the subject of history, is occupied by the subjects who share almost the same portion of the total. While 38% prefer a man teacher instead of woman, 30% choose a woman instructor for history lesson. Similarly, 32 of the subjects do not give any direct answer related to gender.

6. How much do you agree with the following sentences?

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5
Men are better for a scientific profession / 27 / 37 / 20 / 14 / 1
Men prefer profession that brings them into contact with other people / 16 / 51 / 14 / 16 / 2
Women prefer a profession that will bring them economic independence / 19 / 41 / 23 / 13
Men more than women prefer to become artisans / 29 / 59 / 7 / 5
Women more than men prefer a profession that will provide free time / 25 / 64 / 6 / 5
Men more than women prefer an occupation that pleases them, regardless of earnings / 55 / 21 / 8 / 14
Women more than men prefer a professional career / 24 / 50 / 18 / 6
Employers prefer men for managerial positions / 21 / 50 / 16 / 8 / 3
Women are more suitable than men for jobs that require care / 22 / 40 / 14 / 15 / 5
Men are more suited than women for administrative positions / 5 / 22 / 16 / 46 / 10
Men are more suited than women to deal with young children / 12 / 24 / 10 / 37 / 13
When a woman works, her family suffers / 15 / 46 / 17 / 16 / 6
To make a job men collaborate better than women / 21 / 40 / 23 / 10 / 6
Women learn from an early age not to express their aggression / 14 / 55 / 23 / 7 / 0
Men express their aggression physically while women express their aggression verbally / 15 / 53 / 11 / 18 / 0
Women contribute less than men to the family economy / 5 / 40 / 12 / 39 / 3
Men more than women make the decisions in the family about economical things / 9 / 52 / 17 / 9 / 1
Women make the decisions in the family about their children’s education / 8 / 32 / 27 / 28 / 3
Men make the decision in relation to family’s entertainment and holiday / 7 / 56 / 24 / 11
Women make family’s shopping / 18 / 51 / 20 / 9 / 1
Men who have lots of experiences with “girlfriends” are considered more acceptable by the society as the woman with the same experience / 15 / 52 / 26 / 2 / 5
Women manipulate to get what they want / 20 / 71 / 2 / 3 / 1
Media foster or justify the sexism / 30 / 50 / 7 / 7 / 4
Men usually talk more than women about their emotional life / 12 / 17 / 6 / 48 / 14
Men go out more often than women at night / 24 / 56 / 8 / 9 / 1
Women spend more time taking care of their physical appearance / 32 / 67 / 3 / 7
Women participate more than men to friend-meetings / 15 / 52 / 18 / 12
Teachers are more strict with boys / 7 / 42 / 22 / 26
Teachers praise boys for their abilities in mathematics / 10 / 45 / 30 / 22 / 2
Teachers praise girls for their care and their decency / 16 / 41 / 17 / 19 / 4
Boys are more capable in mathematics than girls / 13 / 27 / 21 / 29 / 5
Boys need more encouragement than girls to achieve good performance / 13 / 41 / 30 / 12 / 3
Boys are more disobedient than girls / 13 / 39 / 25 / 19 / 1
Girls succeed less than boys in science and math / 5 / 31 / 16 / 41 / 4
Girls achieve better results in human subjects than boys / 19 / 53 / 8 / 19

The sixth part of the inquery deals with the issue in order to define the situation according to the agreement or disagreement of the subjects with the statements on different parts of life like work, family, school and society itself.

The first 13 sentences are related to work life. It’s clear from the responses that men are regarded as those who are more suited to the professions requiring scientific, numeric skills and body power while women are to do the jobs that are more related to human and public relations. Caring the work to be done is feature of mostly women rather than men. Employers prefer male employees fort he administrative positions even if the majority of the participants men are not as successful in those positions as women are. 46% percent of the subjects agree with the idea that “when a woman works, her family suffers”, which means that women are the most indispensible component of a comfortable and happy family.

The next seven questions are about the relations within the family. We can see that both genders has their own decision making mechanism in various situations of family. Women are more dominant in the matters which are mainly inside home such as what to cook, what to buy for home, childcare, etc. On the contrary, men are the decision makers in issues related to outside of home such as how much money to enter home, what to do as social activities and so on.

The next seven questions are about the perceptions about man and woman within the social life. The pressure on women within the society shows itself more clearly in society with a wide range of general conceptions than in family or at home. With a percentage of 80%, Turkish society believe that media plays a crucial role in shaping the idea of sexism in people’s minds. The majority also believes that it’s the women who take care about their physical appearance more than men do. Additionally, the women create their own social atmosphere with other ladies by organizing more friend-meetings than that of men.

The last eight questions are directly related to education life, school. The answers show the general idea that boys are better than girls in subjects like mathematics, science or computer skills while girls are considered more successful than boys in human subjects, languages, etc. It’s a common belief in Turkey that boys are more successful in subjects mentioned above and the girls are better in lessons which do not require much numeric and scientific skills. That’s why they are guided by their teachers to choose the departments for university education according to what lessons they are good at. While any girl who studies in one of the departments that are mostly occupied by boys is considered extremely clever (since the department requires a great mental ability), any boy who chooses to study in a department related to girls is regarded as unsuccessful, luckless or even fool most of the time.

Professions Related to Gender

Man / Woman / Both
Nursery / 1 / 91 / 7
Primary School / 2 / 76 / 22
Chef / 77 / 1 / 20
Telecommunication engineering / 93 / 2 / 5
Electricity / 95 / 2 / 3
Photography / 36 / 10 / 54
Secretarial work / 3 / 72 / 25
Cashier at a supermarket / 17 / 57 / 25
Surgery / 57 / 4 / 39
Nursing / 5 / 90 / 5
Fire control or fire fighting / 92 / 3 / 5
Politics / 71 / 5 / 24
National security / 74 / 5 / 21
Driving heavy machinery / 97 / 3 / 0
Fishing / 62 / 4 / 34
Agriculture / 41 / 17 / 39
Hairdresser / 14 / 35 / 50
Manager / 14 / 22 / 62

Finally, the last part of the questionnaire handles the gender issue from the point of views on various professions done mostly by certain gender. With the percentages of 91, 90, 72, 57 and 35 in order, the most prominent professions which are considered to be mostly done by women are nursery, nursing, teaching in primary school, secretarial work and working as a cashier. Again, when looked at these professions, it’s clearly seen that they are lighter in terms of body power when compared to the other five most popular professions related to men like driving heavy machinery, working in electricity, telecommucication engineering, firefighting and working as a chef.

The data was analysed and prepared by

Didar AKYÜZLÜ

TURKİYE