Abstract:

Contemporary teachers, who used to work with printed materials in the past, produce and store the information in digital environments thanks to rapid advances in information and communication technologies. The safety of the digital information processed by today’s teachers carries utmost importance as they are supposed to employ current information technologies in their instructional endeavors. In this regard, the purpose of the current study has been derived from the importance of sustaining digital data security of teachers. Thus, the aim was to develop a scale to identify the digital data awareness of teachers. A comprehensive literature review followed by focus group interviews with critical partners led to an item pool of 93 statements. After the revisions of 12 field experts, the draft form was piloted with 79 teachers. An exploratory factor analysis was performed with 529 teachers to investigate the construct validity of the scale, which revealed a single-factor structure sheltering 32 items. The five-point Likert structure revealed acceptable internal consistency α: 0.945 and variance values 36.1 % . A confirmatory factor analysis with a new sample of 335 teachers was conducted to confirm the factor structure. Through modification indices, the single factor structure reached ideal values. As the reliability and validity features of the scale were acceptable, it can be used in further research successfully.

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