Digital Lives of Refugees: Their Use of ICTs in Türkiye

Abstract

Arguably amongst the ways refugees can adapt to the society they migrate to is their knowledge and competence in the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). One of the ways that refugees who had to migrate from their countries due to compulsory reasons could make their lives easier in the country they migrated to was the use of The Internet with the developing technology. In this study conducted to investigate the digital lives of refugees in Türkiye, purposive sampling was used, and data were collected from the study group through an open-ended questionnaire. 14 participants participated in the open-ended questionnaire and the data were collected face-to-face. The data collected from the participants through open-ended questionnaires were analyzed using the content analysis technique. As a result of the study, it was found that digital technologies facilitate the lives of refugees in Türkiye. According to the results obtained from the research findings, it was found that all of the refugees have internet access, they use ICTs in their daily lives for communication and for keeping in touch with family and friends, and they want to improve themselves in ICT use. Based on these findings, the use of ICTs by refugees emerges as a situation in which they want to facilitate their life in Türkiye.