Developing an Attitude Scale towards Face-to-face Education in the Covid-19 Environment

Abstract

The Covid-19 epidemic has adversely affected all stages of social life all over the world. Educational institutions, which are one of the environments where the risk of transmission is the highest due to close contact, have been the areas where the first measures are applied. In this context, distance education decision has been taken by YÖK in all universities since March 2019. Face-to-face education has started again in many universities in the fall of 2021, with the widespread measures taken and the partial control of the epidemic with vaccination. In line with the mask-distance-cleaning principles, students tried to adapt to face-to-face education during the epidemic period. Based on the concerns experienced by students in such an environment, this study aimed to develop a scale to determine students' attitudes towards face-to-face education in an epidemic environment. For this purpose, a draft scale consisting of 30 items was created in the first stage. The KMO value of the scale was 0.884 and the sphericity test was found to be significant. As a result of EFA, a 3-factor, 15-item structure was obtained. The total variance for this structure was 64.133%, and factor loading values were between 0.833 and 0.620. The obtained model was verified with DFA, and GFI 0.935, IFI 0.957, TLI 0.947, CFI 0.957, RMSA 0.061 and NFI 0.932 were obtained. All of these values were within the acceptance range. Likewise, as a result of CFA, the factor loading values of the items were significant, and the AVE and CR values were within the acceptance range. Test-retest, item analysis based on lower-upper groups, item-total correlation test and Cronbach Alpha coefficients for the reliability of the scale were obtained in the acceptance range.