Modified Values in Action Questionnaire (VIA)

Year 2008, Volume: 6 Issue: 15, 89 - 110, 01.06.2008

Selma Dündar Halil Ekşi Ali Yıldız Ali Yıldız

Abstract

The first description of of virtue was done in the antique Greek period. Plato
explained the basic virtues of people as prudence, fairness, courage and moderation.
Aristotales devided the term “virue” into two parts as wisdom and morality, and he
claimed that the man who had a virtue had to have both of these merits. Later, Socrates
thought about this isssue and stated that a humanbeing can only be happy to the extent
that he has virues. Because virtue is equivalent to knowledge.
The realtion of the terms “ethics” and “morality” with “virtue” was occasionally discussed
by too many thinkers. For example, according to Lewis, ethics and morality are
functionally different from eache other, and ethics generally is in the position of examining
the morality. Flanagan admited this difference and made clear the reason of this as
such: ethics includes a theoretical and practical process as compared to morality.
In addition to this, the subject of virtue ethics was discussed by several thinkers. To
Swaim, virtue ethics refers to the principles a person has to pay attention to whenever
he comes across with ethical dilemmas. Several other philosophers share this idea and
believe that virtue, indeed, is inside every individual.
On the other hand, some thinkers thought about the fact that whether virtue can be
taught or not. By taking into consideration what Socrates thought about virtue and
knowledge, ıt can be claimed that it is possible to teach virtue. What’s more, a man
who has virtues also has the responsibility of doing his duties. That is to say that, if a
person is aware of his responsibilities, he can be taught some other merits. Here, Chen
gives us five vital virtues of teachers which wiil help students attain them in daily life:
honesty, courage, anxiety, correctness, practical mind. The teachers who have these virtues
in their daily lives, help students get the same virues as a part of personality. From
the point of view of students, it seems that cultural heritage, gender, ethical education,
religion and ethical dilemma determine thier behaviours. Moreover, according to Blum,
character education in the context of moral philosophy can be seen as virtue. Also, Sosa
believes that if teachers and parents try to influence students indirectly during their long
education process, they may get most of the virtues.
As a result, this research contains the process of adaptation of J. C. Swaim’s Modi-
fied Values in Action Questionnaire (VIA). For this reason, the aim of this study is to
determine bilingual equivalence, reliability, and validity of Jennifer Chandra Swaim’s
“Modified Values in Action Questionnaire (VIA) and its appropriateness for Turkish university
students. This study comprises of two hundred and fifty six university students
(122 female, 134 male) from departments of Marmara University. What’s more, after
both the English and the Turkish version of the scale was applied week by week to thirty
university preparatory class students(30), the outcomes of that application was analyzed
by paired sample t-test. After factor analysis was performed to determine the validity
of structure of the scale, 70 question-items with four factors whose factor coefficients
changing between .60 and .87 were observed. Cronbach Alpha Internal Consistency
Reliability of the scale was found as .92. Both Modified Values in Action (VIA) scale
and Schwartz Values Scale were applied to thirty three 3rd class üniversity students randomly
chosen for the analysis of criterion validity. There were determined meaningful
correlation between the total points supplied from two scales. All the outcomes of this
study show us the fact that the bilingual equivalence of the Modified Values in Action
(VIA) scale is highly reliable and valid.

Keywords

Ethics, Virtue ethics, Value, Reliability, Validity, Higher education, Moral education.

Aksiyonda Değerler Ölçeği Dilsel Eşdeğerlik Geçerlik ve Güvenirlik Çalışması

Abstract

Bu araştırma Jennifer Chandra Swaim (2004) tarafından geliştirilen Aksiyonda Değerler Ölçeği'nin Türkçeye uyarlanması işlem basamaklarını kapsamaktadır. Bu bakımdan bu çalışmanın amacı J. C. Swaim'in geliştirmiş olduğu Davranış Ölçeğinde Değişen Değerler "Modified Values in Action Questionnaire (VIA)" adlı ölçeğinin Türkçe formunun dilsel eşdeğerliliğini sağlamaktır.Araştırma; 122 kadın, 134 erkek olmak üzere toplam 256 üniversite öğrencisi üzerinde yürütülmüştür. Ayrıca dilsel eşdeğerlik analizi için 30 kişiden oluşan yabancı dil üniversite hazırlık sınıfı öğrencisine bir hafta arayla İngilizce ve Türkçe form uygulanmış, uygulama sonuçları ilişkili grup t testi ile analiz edilmiştir. Ölçeğin yapı geçerliliğini saptamak amacıyla faktör analizi yapılarak dört faktörlü 70 soru maddesi elde edilmiş, faktör yüklerinin .60 ile .87 arasında değiştiği görülmüştür. Ölçeğin Cronbach Alpha iç tutarlık katsayısı .92 olarak bulunmuştur. Kriter geçerliği analizi için tesadüfî olarak seçilen 33 kişilik üniversite üçüncü sınıf öğrencisine hem "Davranış Ölçeğinde Değişen Değerler" ölçeği hem de "Schwartz Değerler Ölçeği" uygulanmıştır. Her iki ölçme aracından elde edilen toplam puanlar arasında anlamlı korelatif ilişki saptanmıştır. Tüm sonuçlar, "Davranış Ölçeğinde Değişen Değerler" ölçeğinin dilsel eşdeğerlik ile yüksek düzeyde geçerli ve güvenilir olduğunu göstermiştir.

Keywords

Etik, Değer, Geçerlik, Güvenirlik, Yüksek öğretim, Ahlak eğitimi, Ölçek

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