Browsing by Author "Reyal, H.P."

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Community perceptions on intimate partner violence: A qualitative study from Sri Lanka
(SAGE Publications, 2023) Reyal, H.P.; Perera, M.N.; Guruge, D.
Although plenty of research is conducted to explore the causes of intimate partner violence (IPV), findings are inadequate about the community members' perceptions on IPV. This qualitative study was conducted in a health administrative area of Sri Lanka to explore IPV as perceived by community members in terms of what is IPV, what causes IPV, and what are the responses to prevent IPV. Five focus group discussions and 11 in-depth interviews were conducted with 34 women and eight men. Data were thematically analyzed, and a model on community perception of IPV was developed. It incorporated the individual, relationship, community, and societal levels of the existing ecological framework on causes of interpersonal violence. Perceived apparent and underlying determinants were operating directly and indirectly with complex interactions for the occurrence and continuation of IPV. Pathways of preventing or responding to IPV were identified. Findings on determinants can be incorporated into IPV interventions.
Effectiveness of a community-based participatory health promotion intervention to address knowledge, attitudes and practices related to intimate partner violence: a quasi-experimental study
(BioMed Central, 2024) Reyal, H.P.; Perera, M.N.; Guruge, G.N.D.
BACKGROUND Intimate partner violence is the most common form of violence experienced by women. It has detrimental consequences. A range of determinants cause intimate partner violence and to reduce it, effective interventions are required to address the determinants. Health promotion interventions have been recommended as effective to enable people to control over the determinants and to improve health. Hence, a community based participatory health promotion intervention was developed and tested in a selected study setting. The objective was to evaluate the effectiveness of a health promotion intervention in terms of addressing knowledge, attitudes and practices related to intimate partner violence.METHODS A quasi-experimental study was conducted by recruiting ninety women aged 15 to 49 years separately from two health administrative areas identified as the intervention area and the control area from the Kandy district of Sri Lanka. A pretested interviewer-administered questionnaire was used in both pre- and post-assessments. Selected groups of women from the intervention area were facilitated with a health promotion intervention to improve knowledge, attitudes and practices related to intimate partner violence. To evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention descriptive summaries and bivariate analysis were used.RESULTS The response rate was 90.9% (N = 90) during the pre-assessment and 87.9% (n = 87) and 82.8% (n = 82) from the intervention and control areas, respectively, during the post-assessment. Statistically significant improvement was reported in the total mean score comprising knowledge, attitudes, practices and identification of determinants from 59.6 to 80.8 in the intervention area [Pre-assessment: Mean = 59.6 (standard deviation-SD) = 17.5; Post-assessment: Mean = 80.8, SD = 19.0; p < 0.001) compared to the improvement in the control area from 62.2 to 63.0 (Pre-assessment: Mean = 62.2, SD = 17.3; Post-assessment: Mean = 63.0, SD = 18.9; p = 0.654).CONCLUSIONS The intervention was effective to improve knowledge, attitudes and practices related to intimate partner violence. Hence, the present approach can be used in similar contexts to address the knowledge, attitudes and certain practices related to intimate partner violence.
Knowledge and attitude towards intimate partner violence among ever-married women: A Cross-sectional study from Sri Lanka
(AIJR Publisher, 2020) Reyal, H.P.; Perera, K.M.N.; Guruge, G.N.D.
ABSTRACT: Effective approaches are needed to address high prevalence of intimate partner violence (IPV) against women in developing countries. Among them, addressing the attitudes of women justifying IPV is crucial. Yet, Sri Lankan studies so far have not adequately examined the community members’ knowledge and attitude toward IPV. Hence, this study aimed at i) describing knowledge and attitude towards IPV among women, ii) explore the association of socio-demographic variables with knowledge and attitude towards IPV, and iii) examine the association of knowledge and attitude with the abuse experiences. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with women (n = 600) aged 15-49 years from a selected health administrative area in Sri Lanka. Multistage cluster sampling was used to select participants and data collection was performed using an interviewer-administered questionnaire. Descriptive summaries, cross-tabulations and logistic regression analysis were performed to describe and explore the associations. Most respondents had poor knowledge (64.3%, n=386) on IPV with approximately half of them having attitudes generally justifying IPV (48.7%, n=292). Women with low levels of education and low household income were more likely to justify IPV. Further, employed women had good knowledge on IPV. Poor knowledge on IPV increased the risk of being abuse by 1.5 times and women who had justifying attitudes toward IPV had two times risk of being abuse. The necessity of interventions to be targeted on knowledge and attitudes and the contributory socio-demographic factors such as education, employment and income are emphasized. KEYWORDS: Abuse, women, socio-demographic factors, knowledge, attitude
Prevalence of intimate partner violence across urban, rural and estate sectors: A preliminary study
(College of Community Physicians of Sri Lanka, 2021) Reyal, H.P.; Perera, M.N.; Guruge, D.
INTRODUCTION: Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women continues to be a silent health problem in Sri Lanka. Studies on IPV across different socio-demographic divisions are limited, thus uniform approaches are used to address IPV despite the varying prevalence across different study settings. OBJECTIVES: To compare the prevalence of IPV across the urban, rural and estate sectors through a study conducted in Nawalapitiya Medical Officer of Health (MOH) Area. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was designed to conduct with 701 ever-married women aged 15-49 years using a multistage cluster sampling method. A pre-tested interviewer-administered-questionnaire was used to assess the abuse experienced by the participants during lifetime and past twelve months in the form of physical, psychological, sexual acts and controlling behaviours. Bivariate analysis was performed to compare the prevalence of IPV among the three sectors. RESULTS: The response rate was 85.6% (n=600). Lifetime prevalence of physical (n=237; 39.5%), psychological abuse (n=234; 39.0%) and controlling behaviours (n=188; 31.3%) were high among everpartnered women. Estate women reported more abuse (n=143; 79.4%), physical (n=110; 61.1%), psychological (n=99; 55%), sexual abuse (n=29; 16.1%) and controlling behaviours (n=62; 34.4%) compared to urban and rural women. CONCLUSIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS: IPV prevalence significantly differed across sectors. IPV was highest in the estate sector followed by urban and rural sectors. Designing of IPV intervention should focus on different sectors. The contributory factors within the sectors should be explored and addressed. KEYWORDS: Physical abuse, Psychological abuse, Sexual abuse, Women, Sri Lanka