Identity Functions and Empathetic Tendencies of Teacher Candidates

Objective of this research is to investigate identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates. Sample consists of 232 teacher candidates in social studies teacher education. Survey model is preferred to investigate the difference between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates. And also correlational design is used to investigate the relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates. Findings are: Identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don’t change according to gender, class, education level of mother and father, family income and education type. İdentity functions points of teacher candidates change according to age but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don’t change according to age. İdentity functions points of teacher candidates don’t change according to geographical region but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to geographical region. İdentity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates change according to administrative division. There is not a significant relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates at 0.05 level of significance.


Introduction
Empathy is defined in different ways and these definitions complete each other.Rogers (1983) defines empathy as the process of a person's understanding feelings and his or her thought about a given situation correctly.Empathy ability enables people to evaluate others' emotions and conduct themselves correct (Fitness & Curtis, 2005).Empathetic tendency ensures individuals to empathize in their lives (Dökmen, 1987).Empathetic tendency has dimensions and they are cognitive and emotional components.Emotional empathy is known as an emotional ability that provides to understand others' feelings (Brems, 1989;Jolliffe & Farrington, 2006).Cognitive empathy is defined as a cognitive ability that provides understanding others' feelings (Zahn-Waxler & Radke-Yarrow, 1990).Erikson (1968) assorted process of identity as identity achievement and identity confusion.An achieved identity is usually clear, consistent and well-integrated.But, identity confusion means the lack of a clear and stable sense of self-identity (Schwartz, 2001).Marcia (1966) prepared a identity status model and described four identity statuses; identity achievement, moratorium, foreclosure, identity diffusion.After these models, Adams and Marshall's (1996) undertook identity in terms of its functions told an active identity is a self-constructive and complicated internal system, which has its own psychological functions for individuals.According to Serafini and Adams (2002), names of functions are; providing structure, providing goals, providing a sense of control, providing harmony, providing future orientation.
Conducting researches about functions of identity and empathetic tendencies with teacher candidates is important.Perceptions of students are important elements within the body of university.During the research of literature, no study has been founded about the relationship between these variables.So, after this study, filling these blanks in literature and providing important benefits to education stakeholders is expected.The problems depending on the purpose were determined as below: Do identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates differ according to gender, age, class, geographical regions, administrative divisions, education level of father and mother, family income and education type?
How is relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates?

Research Model
Survey model is preferred to investigate difference between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates according to independent variables.Survey model identifies people's attitudes, beliefs, values, habits, thoughts (Mcmillan & Schumacher, 2001).Besides, correlational design is used to investigate the relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates.Correlational studies aim to correlational relationships between variables using correlational statistics (Balcı, 2011).

Population and Sample
The accessible population consists of teacher candidates in social studies teacher education at Erzincan University, Faculty of Education.The sample is determined by convenience sampling method and the research was conducted with 232 teacher candidates.This method is used when sample is selected easily due to existing limitations of the money, time and workforce (Büyüköztürk, Kılıç Çakmak, Akgün, Karadeniz, & Demirel, 2011).
Information of participants is below: As seen in Table 1; percentage and frequencies were given.

Instruments
As instruments, "Empathic Tendency Scale" developed by Dökmen (1988) and "Functions of Identity Scale" developed by Demir (2011) were used.

Functions of Identity Scale
Functions of Identity Scale was developed by Demir (2011).It has 5 dimensions consisting of 15 items.
The coefficient was 0.92 for the overall scale.

Analyses
SPSS 17.00 program is used to analyze data.Independent Samples T Test and Kruskal Wallis Test are used to examine the difference between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates according to independent variables.Pearson product moment correlation coefficient is used to examine the relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates and 0.05 level of significance was used for interpretation of the results.

Results
Data obtained from "Empathic Tendency Scale", "Functions of Identity Scale" were analyzed.Findings are as follows:  There is not a significant relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates at 0.05 level of significance.

Discussion
According to the findings; identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to gender.Bozkurt (1997) found empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to gender but Pala (2008) found empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to gender.Dereli and Aypay (2012) found significant difference between emotional empathy and cognitive empathy according to gender of students.Göğüş (2013) also found students' genders are related with their personal identities.
Identity functions points of teacher candidates change according to age but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't differ according to age.Balat et al. (2014) found empathetic tendencies points of teachers change according to age.Göğüş (2013) found that students' ages are not related with their personal identities.
Identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to class variable.Karataş (2012) found that empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to class.
Identity functions points of teacher candidates don't change according to geographical region but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to geographical region.Akbulut and Sağlam (2010) found that administrative division doesn't have significant effect on empathic tendencies of primary school classroom teachers.Göğüş (2013) found that students' administrative divisions are related with their personal identities.
Identity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates don't change according to education level of father.Dereli and Aypay (2012) found empathetic tendencies points of high school students don't change according to education level of father.Göğüş (2013) found that students' education level of fathers are not related with their personal identities.
Identity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates don't change according to education level of mother.Dereli and Aypay (2012) found empathetic tendencies points of high school students change according to education level of mother.Göğüş (2013) found that students' education level of mothers are not related with their personal identities.
Identity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates don't change according to family income.Pala (2008) found that there was significant difference between levels of empathy of teacher candidates according to economic level.Dereli and Aypay (2012) found empathetic tendencies points of high school students don't change according to family income.Göğüş (2013) found that students' family incomes are related with their personal identities.
Identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to education type.Göğüş (2013) found that students' faculty types are related with their personal identities.
There is not a significant relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates at 0.05 level of significance.Önen (2012) found significant relationships between identity functions, coping with stress attitudes and emotional intelligece of teacher candidates.Findings of Balat et al. (2014) revealed that there is relationship between emotional intelligence and empathic tendency.Demir (2011) found that functions of identity, namely structure, goals, future, harmony and control, all together predict 28% of life satisfaction scores among young people.
Besides findings, identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to gender, class, education level of mother, education level of father, family income and education type.Identity functions points of teacher candidates change according to age but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't differ according to age.Identity functions points of teacher candidates don't change according to geographical region but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to geographical region.Identity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates change according to administrative division.This research can be investigated with different methods and samples and reasons of findings can searched.
There is not a significant relationship between identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates.
Other variables that affect identity functions and empathetic tendencies may be investigated.

Table 1 .
Demographic informations of participants

Table 2 .
Independent samples T test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to gender Identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to gender (p>.05).So gender doesn't have significant effect on identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates.

Table 3 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to age Identity functions points of teacher candidates change according to age (p≤.05) but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to age (p>.05).Teacher candidates in 26 age and over have highest identity functions mean ranks and teacher candidates in 18-21 age have lowest identity functions mean ranks.

Table 4 .
Independent samples T test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to class Identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates don't change according to class (p>.05).Class variable doesn't have significant effect on identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates.

Table 5 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to geographical region Identity functions points of teacher candidates don't change according to geographical region (p>.05) but empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates change according to geographical region (p≤.05).Teacher candidates from Eastern Anatolia have highest empathetic tendencies mean ranks and teacher candidates from Mediterranean have lowest empathetic tendencies mean ranks.

Table 6 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to administrative division

Table 7 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to education level of father İdentity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates don't change according to education level of father (p>.05).Education level of father doesn't have significant effect on identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates.

Table 8 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to education level of mother

Table 9 .
Kruskal Wallis test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to family income

Table 10 .
Independent samples T test results of identity functions and empathetic tendencies of teacher candidates changing according to education type Teacher candidates from Eastern Anatolia have highest empathetic tendencies mean ranks and teacher candidates from Mediterranean have lowest empathetic tendencies mean ranks.It can be said culture may affect empathetic tendencies but doesn't affect identity functions.Identity functions and empathetic tendencies points of teacher candidates change according to administrative division.Teacher candidates live in town have highest empathetic tendency mean ranks and teacher candidates live in village have lowest empathetic tendency mean ranks.Teacher candidates live in province have highest identity function mean ranks and teacher candidates live in county have lowest identity function mean ranks.