Attitudes of Women Toward Domestic Violence: What Matters the Most?

Domestic violence (DV) is a global public health concern as it has a profound negative impact on women's health. Investigating DV itself was not the concern of this study, it focused on the acceptance of DV by women in Bangladesh. The specific purpose was to explore the prevalence of women's attitudes toward DV and the associated factors. The nationally representative data of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey 2019 were employed in the study. The 15-49-year-old women were asked whether they agreed to be hit or beaten by their husbands for five potential reasons. The outcome variable was a binary variable indicating whether a woman agreed on any of the five reasons. Responses were obtained from 64,378 women and analyzed through bivariate and multivariate procedures. The data had a hierarchical structure since women were nested within the clusters. A mixed-effects logistic regression model was used for the appropriate analysis of the data. The results revealed that many covariates were highly associated with the outcome variable. Education, functional difficulties, ethnicity, and wealth index appeared as the major contributing factors for accepting DV. The study recommends emphasizing education, poverty alleviation, and exposure to mass media to strengthen women's awareness and capabilities to stand against DV.