Health care students' reactions towards HIV patients: examining prejudice, emotions, attribution of blame and willingness to interact with HIV/AIDS patients

Abstract

One of the most pervasive stigmatising conditions in society today is HIV/AIDS. In Trinidad and Tobago, stigma and discrimination are still pervasive especially against persons living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) and at-risk groups. HIV stigmatisation takes place at all levels including health care institutions, and is a major obstacle to effective HIV/AIDS prevention and care. This study examined health care students' reactions towards HIV patients. A stratified random sample of 339 health care students from Trinidad was used. A 2 × 2 factorial design using vignettes manipulated a male patient's sexual orientation (heterosexual/homosexual) and HIV onset controllability (high/low). Multivariate analysis of variance and discriminant function analysis were used to analyse the data. There was a significant main effect of HIV onset controllability on participants' attribution of blame, emotions, prejudicial evaluation and willingness to interact with PLHIV, Λ (.64) F(6, 330) = 31.44, p <.001, = .37. Attribution of blame and prejudicial evaluation discriminated between reactions to patients in low onset control and high onset control vignettes. Cognitive–affective appraisal processes are instrumental in determining health care providers' reaction towards PLHIV.