Religion and Domestic Violence in Nigeria

Using data from 2018 Nigeria Demographic Health Survey, accessed through IPUMS will investigate how religion is related to the incidence of domestic violence of women in Nigeria. This project expands upon previous research from Professor Sara Gundersen, which investigates the relationship between religion and domestic violence of women in Ghana. The results from Professor Gundersen’s research were women who identified as Pentecostal are more likely to have experienced domestic violence than women who were not. Domestic violence in women who identify as Pentecostal have a lower chance of domestic violence when they are wealthier. Nigeria will be an interesting expansion of this research, as there is a sizeable Muslim population, along with different types of Christian and Traditional religions. I will include education, age, wealth, and other explanatory variables, and will also consider the potential role domestic violence attitudes also play. The statistical analysis techniques that will be used on the data will be logistic regressions and multiple linear regression