Turkish Journal of Geriatrics 2013 , Vol 16, Issue 2
THE ADAPTATION OF ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE ELDERLY SCALE TO TURKISH WITH A GROUP OF UNIVERSITY STUDENTS
Veli DUYAN1, Selahattin GELBAL2
1Ankara Üniversitesi Sağlık Bilimleri Fakültesi Sosyal Hizmet Bölümü ANKARA
2Hacettepe Üniversitesi Eğitim Fakültesi Eğitim Bilimleri Bölümü Eğitimde Ölçme ve Değerlendirme Anabilim Dalı ANKARA
Introduction: The main purpose of this study is to examine the validity and reliability of Kogan's Scale of Attitudes Towards the Elderly with a group of university students.

Materials and Method: In order to examine the validity and reliability of the scale, a Turkish version of the form is administered to 911 students from different departments of Ankara, Gazi and Hacettepe universities. Among the randomly selected sample, 627 students (68.8%) were female and 284 (31.2%) were male. Age of the students ranged from 18 to 35, and the mean age for the sample was 21.46 (2.11).

Results: Cronbach Alpha test, showing the internal consistency of the Kogan's Scale of Attitudes towards the Elderly, was 0.789 for positive attitudes subscale; was 0.794 for negative attitudes subscale and was 0.840 for total scale. Principal component analysis was applied to examine the validity of the scale. The results showed that the scale had two dimensions: total variability of the positive attitudes was 16.488%, and the negative attitudes was 9.830%, and total variability explained by these two dimensions was 26.318%.

Conclusion: The current study conducted on a group of university students shows that Kogan's Scale of Attitudes Towards the Elderly is a valid and reliable scale. Keywords : Aged; Attitude; Students