Higher Education in Turkey during Covid-19 Pandemic: Communication Barriers Experienced by Lecturers in the Online Distance Education Process

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study is the communicative barriers experienced by the lecturers working at a university in the south of Turkey during the distance education process, by evaluating Claude Elwood Shannon and Warren Weaver's Information Theory and Melvin DeFleur's communication model who revised this theory, due diligence on distance education of higher education in Turkey. In this study, which was designed using the phenomenology pattern, which is one of the qualitative research methods, an in-depth interview was conducted with a study group consisting of sixteen lecturers who had experience in distance education in the past and were currently teaching distance education, determined by the snowball sampling method. The data obtained from the interviews were transferred to the NVivo 10 program and twelve main themes that hindered the effective communication of lecturers were determined. The determined themes were analyzed with thematic. As a result of the analyzes, it was found that the lecturers were mainly exposed to the legislation-based communicative noise and feedback problem during the distance education process, and this situation negatively affected their job satisfaction and productivity.