A Descriptive Study to Assess the Domestic Violence among Married Women in Selected Rural Area at Erode District

Abstract

Aim: This study was taken in October 2013. There are several reported cases of domestic violence in a rural area at the Erode District, where women are uneducated and dependent. The objective of this study was to assess the domestic violence among married women in the selected rural area and to find an association between the selected demographic variable and domestic violence.

Methods: This was a community-based “Descriptive research design” study. The target population was married women who are experiencing domestic violence. It had ten items of demographic data. They are physical, psychological, economical, and sexual abuses. The data collection tool was validated by three nursing experts in community medicine. Reliability was established by the inter-rated method (r = 0.97), the non-probability convenient sampling technique was used, and the sample size was 60. Data were collected by a structured interview method with 29 items and the collected data were edited, tabulated, analyzed, and interpreted using SPSS 13 version.

Result: The findings of the study showed that the majority of married women, 33 (55%) had severe economic violence, and 35 (58.3%) had moderate psychological violence. There was a significant association between employment status and physical violence (P < 0.05), and there was no significant association between the selected demographic variable and other types of domestic violence (P > 0.05).

Conclusion: The study concluded that married women in rural areas were experiencing more than one type of violence and most common was psychological and economical type of violence. It must be prevented by appropriate screening, referring victims, promoting awareness program on issues, maintaining women’s privacy, and confidentiality.