Sex disparities in attitudes towards intimate partner violence against women in sub-Saharan Africa: a socio-ecological analysis

BMC Public Health

Research Article

Tahereh Moradi¹  Stephen Lawoko²  Olalekan A Uthman³ 

[1] Department of Environmental Medicine, Division of Epidemiology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden;Department of Public Health Sciences, Division of Social Medicine, Epidemiology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden;Department of Public Health Sciences, Division of Social Medicine, Epidemiology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden;Department of Public Health & Biostatistics, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK;Center for Evidence-Based Global Health, Ilorin, Kwara State, Nigeria;

关键词: Human Development Index;    Wife Beating;    Female Literacy Rate;    Justify Wife Beating;    Gender Development Index;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2458-10-223

 received in 2009-06-19, accepted in 2010-04-29,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundAttitudes towards intimate partner violence against women (IPVAW) has been suggested as one of the prominent predictor of IPVAW. In this study, we take a step back from individual-level variables and examine relationship between societal-level measures and sex differences in attitudes towards IPVAW.MethodsWe used meta-analytic procedure to synthesize the results of most recent data sets available from Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) of 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa conducted between 2003 and 2007. Pooled odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were computed for all countries. Test of heterogeneity, sensitivity analysis, and meta-regression were also carried out.ResultsWomen were twice as likely to justify wife beating than men (pooled OR = 1.97; 95% CI 1.53- 2.53) with statistically significant heterogeneity. The magnitude in sex disparities in attitudes towards IPVAW increased with increasing percentage of men practicing polygamy in each country. Furthermore, magnitude in sex disparities in attitudes towards IPVAW decreased monotonically with increasing adult male and female literacy rate, gender development index, gross domestic product and human development index.ConclusionThis meta-analysis has provided evidence that women were more likely to justify IPVAW than men in sub-Saharan Africa. Our results revealed that country's socio-economic factors may be associated with sex differential in attitudes towards IPVAW.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Uthman et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010