Abstract

INTRODUCTION[|]Risk is a concept that encompasses the likelihood of a specific danger being realized and the consequences of the danger. Risky behavior for children and / or adolescents; ‘Voluntary behaviors that threaten their well-being and limit their potential to become a responsible adult'. The moral maturity is defined as 'the sum of ethical qualities that give the richest, most necessary and fullest meaning to the state of being competent and summit in terms of moral emotion, judgment, attitude and conduct'. The hypothesis of the study is that there is a significant difference in favor of the Faculty of Medicine Term 2 students between the moral maturity scale scores and risky behavior scale scores of these two groups. Also, there is a relationship between risky behavior scale scores and moral maturity scale scores of the students in both groups.[¤]METHODS[|]fter obtaining information about the demographic data of the students, the 'Risky Behavior Scale University Form' consisting of 60 items and the 'Moral Maturity Scale' consisting of 66 items were applied.[¤]RESULTS[|]38 (60%) of the students in Period II of Başkent University Medical Faculty, and 26 (40%) of the students in Nursing Department of Health Sciences Faculty participated in the study. The age distribution of the participants is expressed as median (min-max), it is 20 (19-24). The place where the students live before university life is 98.50% urban-city center and 1,50% rural. According to the average score of the maturity of the maturity, nursing students seem to be about 10 units higher than the medical students. This difference was not statistically significant at 95% confidence level (p = 0.081). When the sub-dimensions of risky behaviors were examined, it was seen that the tendency of medical students was high and statistically significant in terms of alcohol and substance use, the tendency of nursing students was high and this difference was statistically significant in terms of school effect. However, there was no significant difference between two groups in terms of other sub-dimensions.[¤]DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION[|]Both hypotheses of study are partially supported. When the moral maturity scores were considered, the scores of the nursing students were higher than the medical students, but this difference was not statistically significant. There was a correlation between the moral maturity scores of the medical students and four of seven sub-dimensions of risk behaviors. As the moral maturity increases in medical and nursing students, tendency decreases in some dimensions of risk behaviors.[¤]