Gender-role attitudes of university students: a cross-sectional study from Türkiye
Abstract
Objective: This study aimed to determine the attitudes of freshmen university students from different faculties of the same university towards gender-roles and to analyse the effect of their socio-demographic characteristics and studying in different faculties on these attitudes.
Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted with the participation of 1080 students studying in the first year of five different faculties of Erciyes University between January-February 2020. The data were collected via face-to-face interview method, using a questionnaire including “Gender-Roles Attitude Scale (GRAS)” and sociodemographic characteristics of the students. In the analysis of the data, frequency, percentage and mean values were used for descriptive statistics, and Pearson chi-square, one-way ANOVA test and T-Test were used for comparative analysis.
Results: The mean GRAS score of the students was 147.7±27.7. While medical students had the highest GRAS scores,Theology students were found to havesignificantly lower scores compared to all groups. Amongsociodemographic characteristics,being female, mother’slevel of higher education and nuclear family were found to be associated with higher scale scores, while low economic level and having only mother or father as the decision-maker in their family were found to be associated with lower scale scores.
Conclusion: Increasing the education levels and employment rates of women will contribute to the development of egalitarian gender-role attitudes of individuals. In order to reveal the effect of religion on gender roles more clearly, there is a need for new studies that will enable more detailed analyzes to be made.
Keywords
References
- Bussey K. Gender identity development. Handbook of identity theory and research: Springer; 2011. p. 603-28.
- Öngen B, Aytaç S. Attitudes of university students regarding to gender roles and relationship with life values. Istanbul Journal of Sociological Studies. 2013(48):1-18.
- Uçar T, Derya YA, Karaaslan T, Tunç ÖA. The attitudes of university students regarding gender roles and violent behaviours. Journal of Continuing Medical Education. 2017; 26(3), 96-103
- Anić JR, Spahić Šiljak Z. Secularisation of Religion as the Source of Religious Gender Stereotypes. Feminist Theology. 2020;28(3):264-81.
- Aydın M, Bekar EÖ, Gören ŞY, Sungur M. Attitudes of nursing students regarding to gender roles. Abant İzzet Baysal University Journal of Social Sciences. 2016;16(1):223-42.
- Ergin A, Bekar T, Aydemir A. Attitudes of students of medical faculty to gender roles and affecting factors. Fırat Medical Journal. 2019;24(3):122-8.
- Zeyneloğlu S, Terzioğlu F. Development and psychometric properties gender roles attitude scale. Hacettepe University Journal of Education. 2011;40(40):409-20.
- Esen E, Soylu Y, Siyez DM, Demirgürz G. Investigation of gender perception in university students according to gender role and gender variables. e-International Journal of Educational Research. 2017;8(1):43-63.
- Turan SÜ, Bilgin V. Religion and intra-family roles in the axis of gender. Uludağ University the Review of the Faculty of Theology. 2020;29(2):459-93.
- Kaya A. The understandings of religion and gender of female students of teology faculty (case of Dicle University). Cumhuriyet Theology Journal. 2019;23(3):1349-69.