Abstract:

The aim of the study is to examine the perceived threat together with social distance towards the Syrian immigrants in accordance with the attitudes of Turkish citizens. The basic assumption of the study is that, the demographic variables like the gender, ethnic and political identities of participants and the socio-economic variables like the overpopulation of the Syrian immigrants who live in their territories and their religious, ethnic, ideological and politcal identities have effects on their attitudes towards the Syrian immigrants. In order to understand the variables which are effective in shaping inter-group attitudes, the study briefly deals with concepts such as immigration, refugee, prejudice, stereotypes, negative stereotypes, intergroup anxiety and theories of threat and social distance. The focus of the study are the attitudes which are developed by citizens of the Republic of Turkey towards the Syrians who are under temporary protection. In this context students of Süleyman Demirel University were selected as the space of the study and the survey had been made face to face with 1209 students. There is no significant difference between threat perceptions of women and men in the study. However, there is significant difference between social distance perceptions of participants according to their ethnic identities.

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