Journal of Community & Public Health Nursing
Open Access

Societies organize their education systems considering the information and qualification criteria expected from individuals. It is possible for the society to reach its visions, goals and targets with the appropriate education system. An education system should have the role of not only transferring information and rules to younger generations but also solving current violence problems and bringing up current needs. Violence is an important public health concern with a high rate of mortality and morbidity in the world [1]. In our country, 30% of the families have been reported to have physical violence, 53% of them have verbal violence and 46% of the children have exposed to physical violence [2]. Murders were reported to have taken the second place in the United States in 15-19 year old youth deaths [3]. Therefore, the concept of violence is one of the main study fields today. In almost every stage of human development, violent behaviors can be seen. One of these periods is the period of young adulthood [4]. In our country, in the young adulthood period, individuals face many problems such as continuing education in another city, trying to adapt to the culture and environment of that city and preparing for a career [5]. Identification of violence as an increasingly irreversible public health concern in the world and our society, identification of risk groups, interventions for these groups will yield successful results.

In this regard, this study was conducted in order to determine the opinions of the students of Gaziantep University Faculty of Education on violence.

Type and purpose of the study

This study adopts a descriptive pattern and was conducted to examine the university students’ opinions of violence.

Setting and time of the study

This research was carried out between April and May 2011 at the Faculty of Education of a university.

Population and sample

The population of the study was composed of 1116 students who study at the Faculty of Education of a university during the 2010-2011 academic year. No sample was selected for the study. Written consent was obtained from the relevant institution before the onset of the research and verbal approval was obtained from the participants. Participation was on a volunteer basis and the data collection form was filled in by the participants.

Data collection tools

For the data collection, a survey prepared by the researcher was used. In the questionnaire, 10 out of 30 items were related to sociodemographic characteristics and 20 items were about violence and violence prevention measures. Open-ended (6) and close-ended (24) questions were included. In addition, the Aggression Scale and the Violence Tendency Scale were administered.

Aggression scale

The Aggression Scale developed by Tuzgöl using Kocatürk’s Aggression Inventory and consists of 44 items for measuring the behaviors related to open, confidential, physical, verbal and indirect aggression in young people. 30 items of the scale were aggressive and 15 items were non-aggressive statements. The scale was 5-point Likert scale. Individuals were asked to choose (5) always, (4) often, (3) occasionally, (2) rarely and (1) never. 13 items were reverse coded. The higher the test score, the higher the level of aggression and vice versa. The scores from the Aggression Scale range from 45 to 225. The Pearson Moments Product Correlation Coefficient was r: 0.85 in the reliability study conducted with the test-retest method. In addition, the Cronbach coefficient of confidence was 0.71. The validity of the scale was examined by Tuzgöl with the criterion group method. Inter-item correlation was 0.76; the internal consistency coefficient was found to be 0.80 [6].

Violence tendency scale

This scale was developed by Göka, Bayat and Türkçapar to determine aggression and violence tendencies. It was reshaped by the Turkish Institute of Family Research and its content validity was ensured in the research on “Domestic and Community Violence” (1998). There were 20 items ranked between 1 and 4. Points ranging from 1 to 20 show very low tendency to violence, 21-40 scores show a low tendency to violence, 41-60 scores show a high tendency to violence, 61-80 show scores very high tendency to violence [7]. In our sample, the Cronbach alpha internal consistency coefficient was found to be 0.85.

Application

The views of the students of the Faculty of Education were collected between April and May 2011 by using the questionnaire. A pilot was conducted with 15 students and these students were not included in the data analysis. 680 students participated in the study. The study was conducted with the permission of the school administration and the consent of the participants.

Data analysis

Statistical analysis of the research findings was performed by SPSS (statistical package for social sciences) 16.00 package program. (Arithmetic mean, chi square etc.)

Ethical procedure

This research was carried out with the official permission of Gaziantep University Health Sciences Institute, Gaziantep University Rectorate and Gaziantep University Faculty of Education.

57.6% of the students who participated in the survey were females, 46.5% were in the age group of 20-21, 56.9% of the students had balanced budget, 40.1% had 3-4 siblings; 80.4% of them had a nuclear family and 55.3% were living in the provincial center. 39.9% of the students were 1st graders; 44.6% were in the Turkish Language Department; 82.3% thought violence as a brute force; 38.7% thought physical violence as the most severe one; 49% thought women were the ones who were exposed to violence the most; 14.9% stated that their parents used violence against them and 70.1% stated that they would their parents if they were subjected to violence. 43.5% of the students wanted seminars to be organized to raise awareness about violence in order to prevent violence in educational institutions; 57.4% stated that families should be informed about child education to prevent domestic violence.

Table 1 shows that 77.9% of participants got between 30-49 scores; 8.2% got between 54-80 scores; 7.9% got between 23-29 scores, 5.9% got between 50-53 scores from Violence Tendency Scale.

Table 1: Grouping of violence tendency scale scores.

Table 2 shows that the 78.7% of the participants got scores between 124 and 165; 15.6% got scores between 101 and 123; 3.5% got scores between 166 and 200 and 2.2% got scores between 65 and 100 from the Violence Scale.

Table 2: Grouping of violence scale scores.

In Table 3, there was a statistically significant relationship between the violent tendency scale and the aggression scale (p<0.05).

Table 3: Violence tendency and violence scale of students.

Table 4 shows the significant relationship between the most severe violence, age groups, measures to be taken against violence and where the people refer to in case of violence (p=0.000). The age group between 22 and 23 stated that families should be informed about child education and found to be the most significant factor.

Table 4: Distribution of the participants by age regarding their violence information.

Table 5 shows that 70.7% of students who live in the province centre, 69.8% of students who live in the district and 67.6% of the students who live in the village weren’t exposed to violence while 17.3 % students from province centre, 9.8% students from the district and 16.2% students from the village said that they were exposed to violence by their parents. There is a statistically significant relationship between the residence of participants and the people who use violence. Those who lived in the province centre and didn’t use violence determined the significance.

Table 5: Distribution of enforcer of violence and place of violence.

Results show that 69.4% of those who live in the province centre, 70.2% of those who live in the district and 71.7% of those who lived in the village weren’t exposed to violence. 13.4% of those who lived in the province centre, 13.4% of those who lived the province centre were exposed to domestic violence, 9.8% of those who lived in the district were exposed to violence at school and 11.1% of those who lived in the village were exposed to domestic violence. There was a statistically significant relationship between the residence of participants and the place they were exposed to violence (p=0.024). Those who lived in the village and weren’t exposed to violence determined the significance (Figures 1 and 2).

Figure 1: Graph of violence tendency scale.

Figure 2: Graph of violence scale scores.

It was determined that 46.5% of the students in the study were in the age range of 20-21 years since they were university students.

82.3% of the student participants described violence as brute force.

In the study of Daglı conducted in Duzce 85.6% of participants also described violence as brute force [5]. Therefore our study is in line with the study of Daglı (2009). Students identify violence physically and do not care about other types of violence. For this reason, we can say that the information deficits related to the subject have to be determined and corrected.

As for the most severe violence; 38.7% of the students chose physical violence, 38.5% of them chose sexual violence. 29.6% of the students stated that they were exposed to violence, 70.4% of them stated that they weren’t; among the ones who were exposed to violence 50.2% of them stated their parents, 16.9% stated the children in their school, 15.9% stated their older brothers, 12.9% stated their instructors and 4.4% of them stated their relatives as the source of violence. In the study of Aras et al. [8] 4% of the students stated that they were exposed to emotional violence by their teachers, 52.8% of them were exposed to emotional violence by their parents, 61.8% of them were exposed to emotional violence by their friends. 42.9% of the students were exposed to physical violence by their teachers, 33.6% of them by their parents, 24.9% of them by the children in their school [8]. The top-ranking violence type in a society is physical violence followed by sexual violence. In the studies of among the people who were exposed to violence 49.3% were females, 24.7% were weak people and 21% were children and were exposed to violence by their parents [5,9].

All this information shows us that it is not possible to get rid of the violence with the one-way interventions. The whole mindset of the society needs to be changed. Our findings show parallelism with other studies in this field. This may be because of the age average of the population. In the study of Mor Catı which was conducted between 1990-1996 and with 1259 women participants it was stated that 88.2% of women live in a violent environment and 68% of them were exposed to physical violence by their husbands. Again, according to the Mor Catı Foundation among 550 women who took shelter in Mor Catı between the years of 1992-1995, 84% stated that they were exposed to domestic violence. In a study conducted with 599 women in South east region 57% stated that they were exposed to the physical violence [10,11].

80 women (57.2%) were found to have experienced physical violence for at least a year in a survey conducted by 140 females who applied to psychiatry department of Istanbul University Faculty of Medicine with various mental problems [11]. The difference between the findings may be caused by the regional and socio-cultural characteristics of the place where the research is conducted or the age, education, employment opportunities, economic competences, etc. of women in the sample group and their spouses. 43.5% of the students who participated in our study stated that seminars should be organized to increase the sensitivity towards violence and prevent it in educational institutions and 27.6% of them thought the violence in education is due to student behavior [12].

77.9% of the students who participated in the study had a score of 30- 49 from Violence Tendency Scale (Table 1) and 78.7% of them had scores of 124-165 from Agression Scale (Table 2) and there was a statistically significant relationship between violence tendency scale and aggression scale (p<0.05). It is known that the most triggering emotion that makes individuals use violence is anger [13]. This shows that students are a risk group for violence [14]. In the study conducted by Uysal [15] 57.8% of the students were found to be “low”, 37.9% of them were “much” and 2.9% of them were “very much” violent on the violence tendency scale [15]. The findings of our research are similar to the findings of these two studies. Bayındır conducted a study with 88 mothers in the scope of ‘’Mutlu Aileler, Gülen Yüzler’’ project and examined the reactions of children regarding domestic violence in this study. The first reactions of children towards violence include crying and the going into the state of shock. The long term results are increase in the violent behaviors, anger and anxiety and developing an addiction to the mother [16].

10.3% of the students who are between the ages of 18-19, 12% of the students who are between the ages of 20-21 and 24.3% of the students who are between the ages of 22-23 and 28.9% of the students who are above the age of 24 stated that the children shouldn’t be allowed to watch violent movies on TV (Table 4).

As the students grow older they state that the children shouldn’t be allowed to watch violent program on TV. Especially those who are 20-23 years old strongly stated that they were against TV. Televisions as a visual and verbal communication devices leave a trace in children’s life. Television as a means of visual and verbal communication leaves effective traces, especially during childhood [16]. Some researchers who are studying TV and aggression have stated that violent TV programs don’t make children aggressive its the other way around; children watch violent media because they are aggressive [17,18]. In visual media, violence is shown as a representative of power especially in cartoons of superhero which is an issue that has been argued a lot [17]. Recent studies have shown that there are a large number of violent television programs. The effect of these programs on individuals, especially on children, is an object of interest. The reason for the high ratings of mafia series in our country is probably this tendency. The characters in such series are portrayed as people who are strong, nice and helpful and do not hesitate to fight for their ulterior purposes. These characters represent violence as something to be justified with their helpfulness and kindness. The intensity of the violent scenes in these kinds of TV series causes desensitization in the audience. Studies regarding desensitization support this claim [19]. Observing violence causes emotional deviance, reducing the individual’s’ awareness towards the environment.

A statistically significant relationship was found between the measures to prevent violence in the family and age groups (p<0.05).

73.7% of the students in the ages between 18-19, 73.5% in the age range of 20-21, 63.5% in the age of 22-23, 59.3% in the age of 24 and above, stated that they refer to their parents in case of violence. 10.3% in the age group of 18-19, 7.6% in the age group 20-21, 8.8% in the age group 22-23 and 22% in the age range of 24 and above stated that they refer to the police stations in case of violence. This shows that individuality and the rate of referring to the law or a police station increase with age while the rate of referring to parents decreases in case of violence. There is a statistically significant relationship between the authority the students refer to in case of violence and age groups (p<0.05) (Table 4).

In our study, 34% of students between the ages of 18-19, 33.1% between 20-21, 52% between 22-23 and 47.5% of the students aged 24 and above stated physical violence as the most severe violence type. 48.1% aged between 18-19, 38.5% aged between 20-21, 31.8% aged between 22-23, 30.5% of the students aged 24 and above stated sexual violence as the most severe violence. This shows that physical violence is perceived as “violence” without exception. In other words, physical violence is the first thing that comes to people’s mind about violence. This is probably due to the fact that in media violence is always mentioned with physical force and behavior and therefore it reminds people of brute force. As their age increases, people seem to care more about the verbal violence and they state physical violence as the most severe violence type. There was a statistically significant relationship between age groups and the most severe violence (p<0.05) (Table 4).

In our study, 70.7% of the students in the province did not experience violence, 17.3% of them were exposed to violence by their parents, 69.8% of those living in the district weren’t exposed to violence and 9.8% of them were exposed to violence by their parents, 67% weren’t exposed to violence and 16.2% were exposed to violence by their parents. A statistically significant relationship was found between the persons who used violence and the place of residence (p=0.008) (Table 5). Non-violent people living in the city center were identified as the significant factor. 69.4% of the residents in the province center were not exposed to violence while 13.4% of them were exposed to domestic violence; 70.2% of the people from district region were not exposed to violence while 9.8% of them were exposed to violence at school; 71.7% of those who live in villages weren’t exposed to violence while 11.1% of them were exposed to domestic violence.

There was a statistically significant relationship between the place of residence and the place of violence (p=0.024). Those who live in the village and weren’t exposed to violence were identified as the significant factor. In the studies of the place where students were exposed to violence the most was school and the people whom students used violence against were their friends [20,21]. In the study of Bulut, it was revealed that out of 302 acts of violence 74% of them happened inside schools [22]. These results are similar to our findings as well.

The research is limited to the students of the Faculty of Education of a university in the province of Gaziantep. Only 61.1% of the population (total 680 students) could be reached because of the students’ absence and unwillingness to participate in the study.

As a conclusion, a significant majority of students describe violence as brute-force. Besides, those who firstly applied to their parents when they were subjected to violence and those who define the most serious violence as sexual violence are the major findings of our study. In the direction of these results; the parents of the students in the 22-23 age group should be informed about child education and students should be made aware of the physical dimension of violence as well as the emotional, sexual and economic dimension. Furthermore, families should be informed about issues such as anger management, friendship skills, intra-familial communication, and respect for individual.