Determination of nurses’ views on gender role attitudes: A Cross-sectional Study

Background: Gender roles have been defined as the roles and responsibilities attributed by the society to women (feminine) and men (masculine) and how the society views, perceives, thinks of them and the expectations of the society about how they should behave. Awareness should be increased in nurses so that they can take a look at their own lives critically. This study was conducted to find out the views of nurses about gender role attitudes. Methods: This descriptive study was conducted with 200 nurses who agreed to participate in the study in a training and research hospital between June 15 and August 15, 2017. The data were collected through face to face interview with a questionnaire form. Questionnaire form consists of descriptive characteristics form and Gender Role Attitudes Scale (GRAS). Descriptive and analytical statistics were used in the assessment of data. Results: Average age of the nurses who participated in the study was found as 30.37±7.28. It was found that 83.5% of the nurses had not received any education for gender roles. It was found that almost half of the nurses thought the best aspect of being a man was “being free”, while the best aspect of being a woman was “being a mother”; it was also found that men should not “show violence” and women should not “be unfaithful”; both genders should be taught to “be respectful” and “not be allowed to be disrespectful”. Nurses’ average GRAS score of 121.18±11.37 showed that they had equalitarian attitude about gender roles. Conclusion: The results that nurses can look at their own lives with a critical eye and have an equalitarian attitude in gender roles are significant in terms of more quality and equality-based health services.