Abstract:

The purpose of this study was to examine relationship of multiple itelligence profiles with university entrance exam scores and area of concentration in high schools. Study group were 200 high school graduates. Multiple Intelligences Inventory (MII) was used to collect data about multiple intelligences profile of students. Differences in MII scores by area of concentration (namely, turkish-linguistic, mathematics and other areas) were tested by using ANOVA. Differences in MII scores by gender were tested by using t-test and correlations between MII scores and university entrance exam scores were computed . Findings indicated only linguistic intelligence and logical-matehmatical intelligences scores showed significant diffrences by area of concentration. There were no significant differences by gender. Turkish-linguistic scores in university entrance exam showed significant positive correlation with linguistic, interpersonal and naturalist intelligences and a negative significant correlation with logical mathematical, spatial and bodily-kinesthetic intelligences. Mathematical score in university entrance exam showed a significant negative correlation only with linguistic intelligence. Summary Enrollment in undergraduate programs is one of the major educational problems of Turkey. High number of students desiring to enroll in a graduate program and inadequate number of available program made the centralized university entrance exam necessary to select students for undergraduate programs in Turkey (Kelecioğlu, 2002). Since students are not guided to specific fields that match their skills and preferences, number of students who enrolled in undergraduate programs that match their skills and preferences is relatively low. It is also known that many students drop from their undergraduate programs in their first year because of the mismatch between their abilities and preferences, and goals and expectations of undergraduate programs that they are enrolled. Intelligence has already been defined by educational psychologists in different ways. According to these definitions, sometimes intelligence is a score obtained from a test and sometimes adaptation to an environment, and sometimes intelligence is taught as a problem solving capacity. Intelligence has been characterized as an important factor to define individual differences which is related to the mental development is measured by various intelligence assessment tools. The theory, which rejects the belief that those students who can not learn is not successful, points out the importance of designing educational activities according to students' types of intelligence. Most educational activities in school are planned according to students' analytic and arithmetic intelligence. It is often assumed that if students' analytic and arithmetic intelligence are highly developed, students are successful as a result of educational activity. If students have not fully developed their analytic and arithmetic intelligence, they become not successful. Problem This study examines the relationship of multiple itelligence profiles with university entrance exam scores and area of concentration in high schools. Specifically, following questions were investigated under the primary purpose of this study: 1.Are there diffrences in multiple intelligence scores by area of concentration and by gender? 2.Are there significant relationships between multiple itelligence scores and university entrance exam scores? Method The study population consisted of high school graduates and seniors who enrolled in a university entrance exam preparation courses between 2003 and 2004 in Kayseri and Kdz Ereğli. The total of 200, 30 graduate and 170 high school seniors, participants were selected from the study population using random selection. The Multiple Intelligences Inventory adapted from Özden (2003) was used as an instrument in this study. The inventory is a likert-scale type and it has ten sections and eighty items. Each items in the inventory has five categories and these categories are 0-strangly disagree, 1- disagree, 3- undecided, 4- agree, 5- strongly agree. All participating students completed the inventory and returned them to researchers. Analysis Differences in MII scores by area of concentration (namely, turkish-linguistic, mathematics and other areas) were tested by using ANOVA. Differences in MII scores by gender were tested by using t-test and correlations between MII scores and university entrance exam scores were computed. Results and Discussion The statistical analysis indicated that the level of scores measuring the linguistic and analytic intelligence of students who graduated from high school with Turkish-Math concentration was higher than other students graduated from high school with different concentrations. The results of this study are consisted with the studies conducted by Hamurcu in 2002, and Oral in 2001. Also results showed that visual and linguistic intelligence of males are higher than females which supported results other studies (Bennet, 1996; Furnham, Clark Bailey, 1999; Furnham Fong, 2000; Hamurcu, 2002; Loori, 2005; Loori, 2005). Results of this study should not be used to make generalization for other students group because of the limited sample size. Further studies should investigate the question with more subjects representing all students in Turkey.

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