Reflexivity in general terms refers to the process of taking the role of others and evaluating oneself from the others’ perspective (Rosenberg, 1990). According to Holmes (2015), emotional reflexivity is the interpretation of one’s own and others’ emotions and their interaction. Since the social interactions transformed into more complex and diverse relationships, emotional reflexivity becomes a more pivotal part of the people. Especially when faced with new situations and/ or feelings, learned rules of emotions might be unclear and people may draw new emotional roads to navigate themselves (Holmes, 2010).

Rosenberg (1990) asserts that people’s reflexivity can change the nature of emotions ineradicably. There are two aspects of the self; external and internal (Rosenberg, 1986). The external aspect of the self refers to the overt, public and visible characteristics such as physical characteristics, social identity elements. The internal aspect of the self refers to the invisible parts such as cognitions, emotions, and sensations. People can regulate, reflect upon and generate changes in their emotions (Rosenberg, 1990).

Reflexivity assists researchers and employees who are working with difficult issues like trauma, assault, and cultural differences to examine themselves and their effects on their work. They need to be self- aware and reflective of the meaning-making process (Aluwihare- Samaranayake, 2012). Conducting a study with a reflective point of view support employees to be objective and egalitarian while understanding the power relations and incidents with reflexivity (Hooks, 2000). There are 21.3 million people who left their country of origin forcibly and almost 4 million of them settled down to Turkey (UNHCR, 2019). Turkey becomes the country that has the largest number of refugee people in the world including not just Syrians but also Iraqis, Afghans, Iranians and Somalians (UNHCR, 2019). 

Turkey started to receive Syrian citizens in 2011. Turkey started to take short-run measures for Syrian citizens at the beginning and called them ‘guests’. The government in Turkey conducted an ‘open door’ policy for Syrian citizens an accepted all the people who came from Syria (UNHCR, 2014). There are different designations for Syrian citizens in Turkey such as guests and Foreigners under Temporary Protection. 

Refugees’ arrival to a new country and meeting with new cultures and customs comes with a challenging adaptation process and many studies about refugee adaptation and integration. The war in Syria affected Turkey and caused many refugees to migrate to Turkey and the resettling of Syrian refugees in Turkey brings along many studies and research. These studies are mainly focused on the migration experiences and the basic needs of refugees (Balkar, Şahin & Işıklı Babahan, 2016; Doğutaş, 2014; Dorman, 2014; Ereş, 2016; İstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi Çocuk Çalışmaları Ünitesi, 2015; Kaya & Kıraç, 2016; Mercan Uzun ve Bütün, 2016; Özel, 2018; Özer, Komşuoğlu & Ateşok, 2016; Sakız, 2016; Şeker & Sirkeci, 2015).

The aim of this research is to describe the individuals, who are working with refugees, emotional experiences as a result of engaging with issues of cultural diversity and analyze the emotional experiences in the scope of emotional reflexivity. There is an increasing body of research about emotional research, especially in relation to challenging issues like cultural diversity and social justice. However, these research mostly emphasize the refugees’ emotional experiences (Birman & Tran, 2008; Cho, Wang & Christ; 2019; Fenta, Hyman & Noh, 2004; Hartley & Pedersen, 2015) and the local citizens’ emotional reactions towards refugees (Bambrick, 2016; Verkuyten, 2004; Verkuyten, Mepham & Kros, 2018).

The sample of the study consists of 11 people who are working with refugees at different non- governmental organizations such as the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR). The research consisted of the semi-structured interviews with the participants carried out between 45 minutes to 90 minutes. Six of them graduated from their bachelors’ degree from different departments such as Psychology, Guidance, and Psychological Counseling and Elementary Mathematics Education. Five of them have their masters’ degrees from different fields such as International Relations, Clinical Psychology and Guidance, and Psychological Counseling. The age of the participants varies from 24 to 40 years. In addition, years of experience range from one to 15 years. On the other hand, most of the participants are newly graduated from their departments who are young and have limited experience in the field. Semi-structured interviews were used in this research. Interview protocol was designed by the researchers and referring five areas: (1) Demographic information of the participants (2) Organization that the participant is working/worked (3) Needs of Refugees and Experiences of the participant (4) Feelings of the participant while s/he is working with refugees (5) Suggestions for the people who start to work with refugees. The informed consent of the participants is taken at the beginning of each interview. The flow of the interviews and the confidentiality issues are taken into consideration during the informed consent. There are some participants who wanted to read all the interview protocols before the interviews conducted. The researcher informed those participants by email to ensure autonomy. As Bogdan and Biklen (1998) stated interviews start with the demographic questions and common experiences as a warm-up process. Prompt (reminders) and probes (further inspections) are used to understand the phenomena in-depth during the interviews. Interviews carried on ranged from approximately 45 minutes to 90 minutes. The timeline for the data collection process was a period starting from the beginning of December 2019 to the end of January 2020.

This research aims to describe the individuals, who are working with refugees, emotional experiences and analyze the emotional experiences in the scope of emotional reflexivity. The analysis of the semi-structured interviews with people who are working with refugees demonstrated as two main themes: (1) Praxis and (2) Reflexivity. the theme called praxis has two codes as advocacy and reflective action. The theme called reflexivity has four codes as awareness of feelings, awareness of social distance, awareness of wider social and political context and coping strategies. The results of the study present the results in two sections regarding the main themes of the study. Refugee adaptation is not a new topic to discover in the field of education. There are numerous worldwide studies about refugee needs and problems during the adaptation process ( Center for Middle Eastern Strategic Studies, 2015; Culbertson & Constant, 2015; Dryden- Peterson, 2011; İstanbul Bilgi University Child Studies Unit, 2015). Although, adaptation process requires an ecological perspective, including all stakeholders of the refugee adaptation issue with the employees who are working with refugees, the examination of the employees’ needs and problems stay restricted both number and scope. There is an urgent need to analyze the employees’ needs and giving them a voice, consider them during the adaptation process of refugee people.

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