Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çiğdem Kentmen Çin, Lecturer at IUE Faculty of Business, Department of Political Science and International Relations, has been awarded the “Distinguished Young Scientist Award (GEBIP), 2014” of the Turkish Academy of Sciences (TUBA) in the field of political science. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çin will receive her award on June 23 at a ceremony that will take place in Ankara.  

Turkish Academy of Sciences, an affiliation of Ministry of Science, Industry, and Technology, which was established in 1993 in order to promote scientific researches in Turkey, has been awarding young scientists under the age of 39 who become prominent with their internationally recognized scientific studies each year since 2001. The awards, based on merit system principles, were granted to total of 15 people this year in the areas of nature, engineering, health, and social sciences. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çin will be receiving a grant of 20 thousand TL for her scientific researches for 3 years. 
Impressive, prejudice reducing researches!

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çin, who was deemed an award in the area of political science, stated that she focused on the effect of religion on public opinion in terms of viewing European Union (EU) and foreign policy in her studies. Çin said, “I have 15 works and more than 20 conference papers published in international and national journals and books. I conducted surveys to prove that the prejudgements about Muslim communities having negative and hostile attitude towards Christians, especially after 9/11 attacks, were groundless. Islamic Religiousness in our country does not have a negative impact towards an organization such as EU, which is sometimes considered as a Christian club.”

Breaking the routine

Another prejudice that was overcome by her studies was the view of workers towards EU. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çin stated the following:

“There is a common belief that unskilled workers in Turkey supports membership to EU more than other professional groups because they want to migrate to the West based on free movement right. Some even think that the reason for Turkey not being allowed as a member sooner is due to the expected migration from Turkey to EU countries. However, studies reveal that unskilled workers do not support EU membership more than other professional groups. General contributions on Turkish economy that come along with the membership do not affect the view of the citizens towards EU.”