Abstract:

Cultural psychology focuses on the influence of self on the concept of self-construal used in the context of autonomy. Cultural environment in which they live affects their own cognitive, emotional and motivational structures as well as their self. The independent self-model proposed by Western psychology is questioned. Cultural researches have shown that the Western self-model cannot be applied to the self-development of all people. Kağıtçıbaşı has proposed a new model which reveals the development of three different types of self-construal (autonomous-separated, dependent-relational and autonomous-relational) that emerged in the form of three different families in which autonomy and relativity coexist. The concept of gender is a set of norms or culturally defined expectations that describe how a person should be treated, and it also contains stereotypes of a certain sex. The aim of this study is to reveal the relationship between the self-construal and gender perceptions of students who are studying at the Education Faculties of Maltepe and Kocaeli Universities. In addition, the relationships between students' self-construal and gender perceptions and various socio-demographic variables are examined. So, a total of 415 students, 305 of whom are female and 110 of whom are male, are identified as the sample of the students attending Maltepe and Kocaeli Universities Faculties of Education. The results show that, students’ autonomous-relational self-construal differ significantly according to the educational level of their mothers, their sex whereas relational self-construal vary significantly according to their abode and that their gender perceptions change according to their residency and sex. Besides, a significant and positive relationship has been found out between each of the three self-construal and their gender perceptions.  Findings from the study were evaluated to be consistent with the literature. 

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