The Effect of Gender Psychology Courses on Sexism: A Prospective Study

Abstract

Today, research are continued to be conducted to deal with the issues of sexism and discrimination in all layers of social life. In the studies conducted with mental health experts within the literature in the literature, it is understood that mental health experts do not have sufficient knowledge on this subject. This study, which aims to inform undergraduate psychology students on the issue of sexism, seeks to investigate the effect of the course specifically prepared to reduce sexism taken by the students during a semester. Participants were chosen from undergraduate psychology students, and it is a cross-sectional study. A sociodemographic form and The Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI) were applied to the participants. 35 students participated in the research, the research was conducted with the pre-test and the post-test. A certain amount of difference has been observed between the scores of the pre-education and post-education hostile and benevolent sexism of all participants. (p<0.001). Moreover, while there was no relationship between students' attendance and hostile sexism scores, students who regularly attended the course had a decrease in their implicit sexism score (p<0.05). According to the results of the research, it was seen that the gender equality course changed the sexist attitudes of undergraduate psychology students positively. Furthermore, similar studies on sexism and discrimination have provided much scientific data on this issue. The government and the public sector should aim to reach larger masses by using this scientific data to advance its interventions on this issue in Turkey.