Determinants of Ethiopian Women's Attitudes Toward Wife Beating.

Abstract

The World Health Organization stipulated that intimate partner violence is one of the most common forms of violence against women and includes physical, sexual, and emotional abuse and controlling behaviors by an intimate partner. Opposition of women against any form of violence at home, beating by their husbands in particular, is a manifestation of readiness to assert their personal rights. This study used data from the 2011 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey to identify some predictors to determine attitudes of married Ethiopian women toward wife beating. The dataset used consisted of 5,818 married women of the reproductive age group 15 to 49 years. While 1,393 (24%) married women did not oppose wife beating, a total of 4,425 (76%) opposed the practice. In the binary multiple logistic regression analysis, age, economic status, level of education, employment status of a woman, number of children living in the household, region (federal administrative regions delineated on the basis of ethnicity), place of residence (urban vs. rural), religion, and husband's level of education have been included as possible socioeconomic and demographic determinants of women's attitudes toward wife beating. The findings showed that the predictors region, place of residence, number of living children in a household, and religion were significantly associated with women attitudes toward wife beating.