ÖZEL EĞİTİM KURUMLARINDAKİ BEDENSEL ENGELLİ ÖĞRENCİLERİN İNTERNET BAĞIMLILIĞI ÜZERİNE BİR ARAŞTIRMA

Nowadays, technological developments are increasing rapidly and with this rapidity enter into every aspect of our daily lives. Especially, personal computers and internet are among the things that are indispensable for people. Personal computers and internet make life easier for us by providing immediate access to knowledge, enabling sharing of knowledge with others, letting us communicate, online shopping and banking just to name a few of the conveniences in our daily lives. While personal computers and internet provide us these conveniences, they also bring a variety of different problems which are a result of excessive use. Internet negatively influences especially the psychological, physical developments and social relations of children of school age. Excessive use of internet/personal computers negatively influences not only the individual's educational development but also his personal development, thus makes him an addict. In this context, it is crucial that the “addiction” concept must be welldefined; the causes, the symptoms and suggestions solutions for the addiction must be clearly presented. Nowadays, internet is one of the most important communication tools. Thanks to the developing technology, it is now very easy to connect to internet from home, school, workplace and the street. With its young population, internet usage in Turkey is more than many countries in the world. We are facing an issue, spending too much time on the internet is a serious problem and needs to be treated from now on. Like all around the world, in Turkey too, there are clinics founded where the internet addicts are treated. The aim of this research is to measure the internet addiction of the physically handicapped students who are enrolled in private educational institutions in Kayseri. Since the physically handicapped kids are not able to move too much, the internet is an important pass-time tool for them. The survey is conducted to measure the students' internet addiction. In the survey, how long the students surf the internet, their mental state, relationships with family and friends when they are offline, how being offline affects their work, school performance, homework and their grades are measured. The obtained data has been turned into a chart and interpreted.