Investigation of the Turkish Cultural Adaptation of International Students Living in Turkey

: In this study, the cultural adaptations of international students studying in Samsun in acculturation processes were examined. The cultural problems that international students inevitably face affect their adaptation to the countries they host. To investigate the effects of the international students' some variables on the cultural adaptation in the context of Turkey constitutes the main objective of this study. In the study, it was examined whether the cultural adaptation levels of international students vary according to gender, place of residence, academic achievement level, education level, faculty they attend, and their age. Within the scope of the research, 670 foreign students participated in this study. According to the research results, the general adaptation level of the students is medium. While the participants' age is a factor affecting cultural adaptation, the students' cultural adaptation does not change according to their gender, place of residence, level of education, academic performance, and the faculties they attend.

has and the society and culture in the country he / she went to has the most important place. Psychological adjustment shows the emotional side of adaptation, socio-cultural adaptation its behavioral aspect, and economic adjustment contributes to the effective life of the individual's job (Şeker, 2015).  associated the adaptation of foreign students with the acculturation model. They stated that there are three dimensions (Social and behavioral adaptation, Affective adaptation, and Cognitive adaptation) in the application of the acculturation model to international students.

Turkish Culture
What sets one nation apart from another is its culture. The main element of culture is its traditions. Some of the traditions of the Turkish society are its language, religion, art and state-building tradition. The Turkish nation, who has been in different communities throughout history, can preserve their culture, although they are in various communities in other geographies. Turkish sociologist Gökalp (1994) is one of the first local sources we can refer to. According to that; The social institutions of the Turkish nation are lives related to religion, language, morality, law, philosophy, reason, aesthetics and economy. Nation is a community of people with a unique culture. Therefore, Turks can have only one language and one culture. The three main groups of the communities that make up the Turkish nation are as follows: 1-Oguz Turks (Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran) 2-Harzem Countries (Tekeler, Sarılar, Karakalpaklılar) 3-Yakut, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Kipchak, Tatars. Senemoğlu (2004) sees education as a process of nurturing an individual's personality or investing in human capital.

Culture and Education Relationship
Based on the definition, it can be argued that education is one of the most important means of transferring the filtered values, knowledge and skills of the society, namely social heritage, to a new generation. On the other hand, as Fidan and Erden (1994) stated, education is the culturing process of the individual. It is acculturation, which means that the cultural values accumulated and developed from generation to generation are adopted by individuals and that the individual reaches the competence to contribute to their development (Başaran, 1992). Although one of the basic tools of acculturation is education, different dynamics affect foreign students. Examining the adaptation processes of Chinese students in the UK,  stated that general cultural differences, academic culture differences, and learning culture differences affect the adaptation process.

International Students and Their Mobility in Turkey
In the OECD's report entitled Education at a Glance 2020 (OECD, 2020), the term "foreign students" refers to students who have an educational purpose and who cross borders for this purpose. With the most common definition, foreign student; he is a student studying in a different country other than his hometown. The sending of students abroad in the first half of the 19th century seems to be a national policy implemented within the scope of the Ottoman modernization policy. During the Ottoman period, Enderun and Tribal Schools hosted international students. There were foreign students in Darülfünun, especially in military, police schools and other madrasas (Erdoğan, 2010).
In general, student mobility in higher education is from developing countries to developed countries, and this situation is economically important in countries where students go to study (Özçetin, 2013). The Soviet Union's disintegration in the early 1990s was to step up the international student mobility in Turkey. In 1992, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics dissolved. After that, a new process started in the world geography. Following the declaration of independence of Turkic Republics of Turkey, the Turkish state and in many areas and communities where relatives has entered into cooperation. The most important of these areas is education cooperation, one of the most concrete examples is the "Great Student Project". This project Since 1992, the Turkish Republic of Turkey and relatives secondary education at tertiary level students and community come (YTB, 2012). The number of foreign students in Turkey is increasing more and more ( Figure 1). 2019-2020 academic year, Turkey has 119 611 international students from 222 different countries in higher education (YOK, 2021). All the developments in the foreign students mobility worldwide, it also affects Turkey. This caused the number of foreign students to increase rapid. The aim of the project, the Turkish Republic and contribute to the education level of the community, trained people to contribute to meeting the power needs of Turkey and has been demonstrated as cultivate a friendly young generation. In this study, academic and cultural adjustment that occurred in the acculturation process of international students studying in Turkey is examined. In this context, the main purpose of this study is to determine how the acculturation process of international students takes place and whether this process is related to their academic achievement.

The Importance of Problems Experienced by Foreign Students
While detailed studies of the adaptation process that foreign students experience while studying in a foreign environment are being done (Pedersen, 1991), education experts do not have a clear understanding of the differences between cultures. This creates a communication gap between educational institutions and foreign students (Heikinheimo & Shute, 1986).
Students who travel from home to other countries for schooling not only face many education issues as international students in the countries. According to a study by Lin and Yi (1997), foreign students struggle with various issues such as cultural and communication problems, lack of social support, language barriers, academic issues, financial, psychological, and entertainment. The problems of foreign students in Turkey made based on the results of different studies are classified as follows: International students often have difficulty eating in the first month because the flavors are different from their own. Many studies have found that foreign students' lack of social integration is a cause of unhappiness and a negative feeling towards the host country (Aydın, 2020; J. Zhou & Cole, 2017).
In the development of intercultural friendships and efficient contact, language capacity is regarded as a significant factor (Aydın, 2020). Ward and Masgoret (2004) found that New Zealand international students claimed that their lack of English proficiency was hindering their interactions with their hosts. Lee (2010) argued that for students from non-western countries who attended universities in the United States and Europe, linguistic gaps were regarded as major barriers.
Different research also demonstrated that personality characteristics influence intercultural partnerships, in addition to the language difference between local and foreign students (Aydın, 2020). Personality as a predictor of the intercultural competence of college students was investigated by Peifer and Yangchen (2017). Extraversion and agreeability were perceived to be essential variables of social interaction in their research.
A further aspect affecting the relationship between local and foreign students has been found to be cultural variations. Many researchers have suggested that local students have an ethnocentric mindset towards foreign students in typical destinations (Aydın, 2020). In the study conducted by  , the cultural dimension even affects the way study of international students. For those foreign students who have never traveled abroad before, the first glimpse of the new culture could be quite complicated. When traveling or researching in a different country, even those students who have already had contact with other cultures will require adaptation (Çetin et al., 2017).
Due to the fact that foreign students encounter different geographic, social, social, cultural, and psychological conditions in the country they go to for education, it is inevitable for them to experience very different problems such as language inadequacy, social adaptation, economic problems, and cultural differences. If individuals cannot use the language sufficiently, they will have adaptation problems and individuals who cannot express themselves psychologically sufficiently experience problems during their social behavior (Karaoğlu, 2007). In summary, related research has found that the absence of language skills, cultural differences, and distinct personality attributes are essential to developing obstacles to local and foreign student relationships. In this context, cultural differences in the adaptation of international students will be discussed.

Method
In this section, information about the research model, study group, data collection techniques, preparation of data collection tool, data collection and methods and techniques used in data analysis are given.

Research Model
This research; conducted with quantitative screening method to determine the cultural differences that foreign students encounter during the education process in Samsun province. Quantitative studies are more precise and generalizable studies using empirical data and statistical methods. There are different types of quantitative research in itself and one of them is survey research. The most general purpose of survey research is to describe the characteristics of the studied sample in terms of certain variable(s) (Fraenkel et al., 2012). In this study, The Adaptation of Turkish Culture Questionnaire (AOTCQ) used to serve analysis.

Polulation and Sample
The population of this research consists of 5270 international students studying at Ondokuz Mayıs University in Samsun in the 2019-2020 academic year. The sample of this study consists of 670 foreign students studying at Ondokuz Mayıs University.

Problem Statement
Is the cultural difference experienced by international students related to their academic success?

Sub-problems of the Research
1-What is level of foreign students about Adaptation of Turkish Culture (AOTCQ)?
2-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of students' gender?
3-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of their place of residence? 4-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of their academic success?
The European Educational Researcher | 161 5-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of their education levels?
6-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of the faculties they study? 7-Is there a statistically significant difference in the level of AOTCQ in terms of their age?

Data Collection Tools
In the research, 5-point Likert type The Adaptation of Turkish Culture Questionnaire (AOTCQ) developed by the researcher was used as the data collection tool. There are 50 items in the first version of the questionnaire. Expert review was consulted for content validity. After the expert opinion, the number of items in the questionnaire was 26.
The questionnaire was applied in 4 languages: Turkish, Arabic, Russian, and English. In calculating the total score of the questionnaire, 3 items were scored in reverse. The increase in the total score of the survey shows that the students have problems with Adaptation of Turkish Culture.

Data Collection and Analysis
The information obtained with the measurement tool is limited to the number of foreign students. It was reached and the information was obtained by analyzing the collected data. These findings are interpreted and reported. Jamovi (1.6.9.0) software used to analyze the data. Descriptive statistics such as arithmetic mean, standard deviation, percentage and frequency were calculated in analyzing the data. To determine the statistical test, first determine whether the total score has a normal distribution. For sample sizes greater than 300, Skewness / SEskewness and Kurtosis / SEkurtosis should be smaller than 7 (Kim, 2013). In this study, Skewness / SEskewness= 0.324/0.0944 (3.43) and Kurtosis / SEkurtosis=0.301/0.189 (1.59). It can be accepted that the total score has a normal distribution.
So independent sample t-test and one-way ANOVA test are used to test the statistical difference (Pallant, 2007).
Statistical significance is based on the 0.05 level. While analyzing the interaction of the dependent variable with the independent variables, Problems experienced by foreign students are dependent variable, cultural differences are independent variables t test, one-way analysis of variance, and LSD statistical techniques were used.

Findings and Interpretation
Findings Regarding the First sub-problem Considering that the min score that can be obtained from the questionnaire is 26, but the min score for the participants is 46, it shows that there are no participants at a very low level. At the same time, the maximum score that can be obtained from the questionnaire is 130, but the maximum score for the sample is 98, which indicates that there are no participants at a very high adaptation level. As a result, students' level of adaptation is medium. While the mean score of male students is 70, the mean score of female students is 70.8. Since p(0.193)> 0.05 according to the results of the independent sample t-test conducted to test the statistical significance of the differentiation, the difference is not at the level of statistical significance. In other words, it can be said that female and male participants are similar levels.  According to Table 4, the mean of the total scores of the students according to academic success are different. The mean score of students who has 70-79 academic success is a bit higher than others. To check the difference is  According to Table 5, the mean of the total scores of the students according to educational level are different. The mean score of students who are in undergraduate is a bit higher than others. To check the difference is statistically meaningful, the one-way ANOVA test is applied. Test results F(3,666)=0.405 and p(0.667) >0.05, so the difference are not statistical meaningful. Participants have a similar level according to educational level.

Conclusion, Discussion and Suggestions
In the study, it was examined whether the cultural adaptation levels of international students vary according to gender, place of residence, academic achievement level, education level, faculty they attend, and their age.
According to the research results, the general adaptation level of the students is medium. In the studies conducted, the gender of the students affects their adaptation. Paksoy et al. (2012) reported that the adaptation of foreign male students to the university is higher than female students. It has been determined that there is a significant relationship between the opinions about the problems experienced in adopting the society and that girls adopt the society more easily than boys (Özçetin, 2013). In the study conducted by Kyalo and Chumba (2011), it was observed that there was no difference between the social and academic adaptations of male and female students. In this study, the cultural adaptation levels of the students according to their gender were not statistically different. On The European Educational Researcher | 165 the contrary, Özçetin (2013) stated that female students have higher social adaptation. As a result, local and international students living away from their families experience financial, accommodation and food and beverage problems. Contrary to our study, Özçetin (2013) and Sungur et al. (2016) reported that there was no significant difference between foreign students' adaptation to university according to their place of stay.
In this study, cultural adaptation levels did not differ statistically according to the academic success of the students.
However, Nasir (2012) concluded that cultural adaptation is effective in the academic success of international students, and states that students who score high on the cultural adaptation scale also have high grade point averages. There was no significant difference between adaptation to Turkish culture and education level.According to a study conducted by Rienties et al. (2012) with 670 international and 288 local students studying in the Netherlands, it was observed that among the international students participating in the study, students from the West were more successful than students from the East in terms of academic and social cohesion. Foreign students shows that differences in opinion about the food culture in Turkey. Most of the students stated that they had difficulty in getting used to Turkish food when they first came, but they got used to it over time. The data obtained as a result of the studies conducted by Schmader, Major and Gramzow (2001) and Sodowsky and Plake (1992) support the research result of Hanassab (2006). Because of the similarities between the students surveyed in Turkey, Turkish culture with their culture they encounter it is determined by prejudice or exclusion. According to findings, students aged 25 and over have fewer problems with adaptation. The group aged 25 and above have fewer problems with adaptation. Age is an effective factor in cultural adaptations. However, according to the results of the study conducted by Özçetin (2013) there is generally no significant difference in the social adaptation of foreign students according to the age variable. In the study conducted by Çetin et al. (2017), it was determined that elderly people were more likely to welcome the behaviors in the host culture.
In summary, while the participants' age is a factor affecting cultural adaptation, the students' cultural adaptation does not change according to their gender, place of residence, level of education, academic performance, and the faculties they attend.

Suggestions
In this study, no analysis was made according to the culture and social structure that the students came from. In future studies, it can be examined whether there is a differentiation in the adaptation of students according to the culture they came from. It can carry out studies involving advanced statistical techniques to determine the level of adaptation of students and the effectiveness of the factors that affect them. The study can be done with different data collection techniques and tools and the results can be compared. As the number of foreign students in higher education institutions increases, universities should offer more social and academic opportunities to these students.