Özet:

Disasters cover all the events that damage both humans and their living environment. The disasters which stem from nature are called natural disasters while those which stem from humankind, are called human disasters. Since humans constantly encounter such events at different times, places and in different forms, it is inevitable that they will be affected by them. Thus, one wonders what people understand the concept of disaster to be. The aim of this study is to identify the students from all the education levels who perceive the concept of disaster and to detect the differences within these perceptions. The study sample consists of 160 students at the level of preschool, primary, secondary, high school, graduate and master studies in Kırşehir during the 2016-2017 academic year. Since the students are thought to reach a specific age and intelligence growth at the final level of each education stage, the participants were selected from the final levels of each education stage. The study was designed using the purposive sampling method and as a qualitative research making use of longitudinal research since it aims to determine how the concept of disaster is perceived at each education level. To determine students’ opinions, a semi-structured interview form which includes two open-ended questions was used, and the validity and reliability studies of the form was conducted with experts opinions. During the interviews, the students were asked “What is a disaster?” and “Can you give examples of disasters?” n the evaluation of the obtained data, descriptive analysis and content analysis methods were used. According to the results of the analysis obtained from the research; It was determined that the students understood the disaster concept mostly wrongly or incompletely.

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