Domestic violence during the COVID-19 pandemic: Attitudes of Croatian students

Abstract

The coronavirus pandemic pose tremendous challenge for all countries of the world. People who experience domestic violence deserve special attention in such social circumstances. The purpose of this paper is to present research on students‘ attitudes about domestic violence in pandemic conditions. In a sample of 334 students from Croatia we analyzed their acceptance of myths about domestic violence, attitudes about domestic violence in pandemic conditions, and the correlation between the acceptance of myths and attitudes about domestic violence. The results indicate the following: students accept myths about domestic violence at the lesser level, they believe that measures to combat coronavirus have led to an increase in all analyzed forms of domestic violence, they do not think that the policingin those cases is well or that victims receive sufficient help and support in pandemics. Differences in students‘ attitudes towards gender and knowledge of the victim were found, as well as the correlation between attitudes and basic political orientation. The correlations between students‘ attitudes and acceptance of myths about domestic violence were also established.

Keywords

• domestic violence
• student attitudes
• restriction measures
• covid-19
• croatia