THE EXPERIENCE OF BEING AN INTERNATIONAL STUDENT IN TURKEY: A STUDY ON METAPHORS

Identifying international students’ perceptions towards being an international student in Turkey is of critical significance with respect to putting forth the factors affecting their academic, social and cultural lives, and reflecting the differences among international students’ perceptions towards the scope of the research in the context of various demographic variables. The literature lack research studies on eliciting international students’ perceptions towards their education experiences in Turkey through metaphors. This study aims to identify international students’ perceptions towards being an international student in Turkey with the help of metaphors. The study employs phenomenology design within the qualitative methods. The data were collected from 93 international students studying at a state university in Turkey in the 2018-2019 academic year. A semi-structured form, developed by the researchers, was used in data collection. The data obtained through this instrument was analyzed through content analysis method. Analysis of the distribution of the metaphors reveals that the majority of the participants developed positive perceptions towards being an international student in Turkey. Nevertheless, there are some students who are experiencing problems with regard to adaptation, economy or communication problems, though they are few in number. On the other hand, there are not significant differences among males and females in the distribution of the metaphors and the newcomers to Turkey had mostly positive perceptions in the first six months, and the percentage of the positive perceptions increases as the time spent in Turkey extends to 12 months; however, after 12 months, negative perceptions begins to increase.

Keywords

Internationalization, higher education, student mobility, globalization, foreign student, guest student