The Effect of Prejudice and Discrimination Education Given to University Students on Gender Perception and Attitude

Abstract

University education may influence attitudes toward gender roles. The awareness of students in the field of health services about the gender inequalities they will encounter both during the education process and in the future while providing health services will play a role in providing health services in a more effective and equitable way. In order for university students to approach men and women with an egalitarian perspective at an early age, their gender stereotypes must first decrease and their perspectives on social relations must change positively. Therefore, university education can play an important role in influencing gender perception and attitudes towards gender roles. There is no special course on prejudice and discrimination in the training programs of Vocational Schools of Health Services that train health technicians in Turkey. Based on this, this study aimed to examine the effect of the training program given to raise awareness of prejudice, stereotypes and discrimination on the gender perception and attitude of students who will provide health care in the future. For this purpose, answers were sought to the following questions: Is there a difference in students' gender perceptions of prejudice and discrimination before and after training? Are there any differences in students' gender role attitudes regarding prejudice and discrimination before and after education? Is there a relationship between gender perception and attitudes towards gender roles? As a method, a single-group the pretest-posttest semi-experimental method was used. The research was conducted with students taking the Prejudice and Discrimination course at the Vocational School of Health Services. 95 second-grade students participated in the research. The reason why sophomore students from the Disabled Care and Rehabilitation program, the Pharmacy Services program, and the Occupational Therapy Program were selected in the study is that the "Prejudice and Discrimination" course is given in the second-grade student spring semester. Descriptive Information Form, Gender Roles Attitude Scale (GRAS), and Gender Perception Scale (GPS) were used to collect data. Before the course program started, GRAS and GPS were administered to the participants as a pretest. Afterwards, a fourteen-week course period on "Prejudice and Discrimination" was carried out. At the end of the course, GRAS and GPS were administered to the participants as posttests. According to the students' descriptive characteristics, it was found that the mean age of the participants in the study was 21.6±3.3, and that 73.7% of them were female. According to the study, most students' mothers (56.9%) and fathers (38.9%) had completed elementary school. The families of 73.7% of the participants are nuclear families. The students' average number of siblings was found to be 2.8±2.1, and the majority (51.6%) of them had both brothers and sisters. The investigation discovered that 43.2% of the students lived primarily in the city center. Most students who participated in the study said that the Black Sea region was where they spent most of their lives (46.3%). The research revealed that prejudice and discrimination training provided via online distance education methods did not affect the gender perception and gender role attitudes of second-year Vocational School of Health Services students (respectively; p = 0.890, p = 0.976). However, a positive relationship was found between gender perception and attitudes towards gender roles (pretest r = 0,825, p < 0,01; posttest r = 0,893, p< 0,01). While the total scale score of women was higher than men according to GPS and GRAS scores according to sex before the training (GPS, p = 0.002; GRAS, p