ANALYSIS OF RESEARCH TRENDS ABOUT GENERATION Z AND THEIR CONTRIBUTIONS TO EDUCATION

The term “Z-generation” defines a group of people born in an era when the daily technologies and certain behavioral patterns are common, and has been mentioned more and more in the literature as well as in media. There are various studies in different fields to seek certain characteristics of Z-generation. In this study, publications about Zgeneration are investigated for a number of aspects, primarily; year, subject, method, purpose, findings and recommendations, Z-generation in educational environments. Descriptive content analyses techniques are used in this investigation. The 131 publications are collected from an academic search engine with the key words: “z-generation”, “netgeneration”, and “i-generation”. Among them 85 are selected as a pre-analysis, consistent with the purpose of this study and accessibility. According to the findings, the most articles are published in the year 2017 mainly about educational profiling. The studies additionally focus on critical features of Z-generation using quantitative methods. The results show that the individuals in Z-generation tend to more use technology comparing to other digital natives. Some unique features such as fast information processing, leadership and sensitivity should be addressed when designing learning environments needed for Zgeneration. It is concluded that technology based tools should be used to reach out this generation.