BASIC DETERMINANTS OF PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR TURKEY’S EU MEMBERSHIP WITH RESPECT TO COGNITIVE LEVEL OF RESPONDENTS

Özet

In this paper, basic determinants of public support for Turkey’s EU membership were analyzed. The data utilized for the study was obtained from Eurobarometer Surveys, and covered a period of nine years, from 2010 to 2018. Unlike earlier studies in which the data was usually collected within a span of a few years, this study, however, consisted of a public opinion aggregate that stretched up to almost a decade. Besides, different from previous studies, in this, effects of determinants were investigated with respect to EU-awareness level of the respondents. Our findings suggest, in line with literature, that the strongest determinant regarding support for integration, was found to be the “expected benefit”, and that the factor “fear of loss of cultural identity” seemed to have a meaningful and negative impact on support for EU membership. However, different from similar studies, the findings do suggest that, as respondents’ cognitive level increased, the effects of “loss of cultural identity” on public support decreased to a level where it became statistically insignificant. On the contrary, the impacts of “expected benefit” and “trust in the EU” variables were detected to increase as the cognitive level of respondents rises. No meaningful relationship was observed between the factors of “age-gender-trust in government” and the dependent variable.