Investigation of the effect of COVID-19 on attitudes of university students towards family violence.

Aim: The aim of the study is to determine the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the attitudes of university students towards domestic violence.

Subject and methods: This cross-sectional study was carried out between 15 June and 15 July 2021 in Turkey. The study sample consists of 426 students studying in the health departments of two universities (faculty of medicine, dentistry, midwifery, nursing) in the 2020-2021 academic year. Data were collected from university students using a university student descriptive form and the Attitudes Towards Violence Scale in university students.

Results: The mean age of the participants was 21.20±2.29 years; 86.4% were women and 40.4% were educated in the midwifery department. It was observed that 39.2% of the students had financial difficulties during the pandemic and 15.3% wanted to leave their school in order not to be a financial burden on their families. It was shown that 4.9% of the students were working for economic reasons during the pandemic period. Psychological and verbal violence was found to increase after the COVID-19 pandemic. There was a significant difference between the students' maternal employment status and the sub-dimension of violence against women (p < 0.05). A significant relationship was found between the educational status of the father and the sub-dimensions of normalizing violence and different dimensions of violence (p < 0.05).

Conclusion: An important finding of our study is that domestic violence, which is a serious problem in our country, has increased even more during the pandemic period. It is recommended that training on domestic violence be given to university students, as training given in schools on this subject can help to increase awareness regarding the prevention of domestic violence.