Understanding the Underlying Factors Affecting the Perception of Pre-Service Teachers’ Teacher Identity: A New Instrument to Support Teacher Education

Abstract

The study aimed to understand the factors affecting pre-service teachers’ teacher identity. The sample of the study was comprised of 286 fourth-year preservice teachers. The draft item pool of the scale was based on the teacher education literature related to the factors affecting teacher identity administered to the preservice teachers studying at a public university in Turkey’s Mugla province. The finding of the study revealed that the scale, which was consisted of 28 items, had six factors. The scale’s six factors explained 63.50% of all the variance as well as the factor loading of the scale ranged from .50 to .88. The internal consistency scores of the scale dimensions ranged from .77 to .90. The item analysis of 27% upper and lower means calculation yielded statistically significant t values. Additionally, confirmatory factor analysis resulted good and pretty high fit indices. This showed that the scale with six factors was acceptable.