Perceived barriers to HIV testing amongst male students of the University of Johannesburg

Abstract: South Africa is one of the countries with a high prevalence of HIV infections and sexual intercourse is a primary mode of transmitting the virus. Young people are at the centre of the epidemic. Young people who are university students are at a much higher risk compared to other young people considering their environment which allows riskier behaviours. Understanding the barriers to HIV testing can help inform interventions tailored for students to improve their HIV testing behaviour. A qualitative study using semi-structured interviews was conducted to explore the students’ perceived barriers to HIV testing. The participants were ten UJ male students residing in selected student accommodations, namely, City Waldorf which is an off-campus accommodation in Johannesburg and Oppirief which is within the premises of the university. The six constructs of the health belief model were used to explain factors and reasons that prevent male students at UJ from testing for HIV. Seven themes that served as barriers to HIV testing for UJ male students were identified, namely, the illusion of being clean and invulnerability, fear of not living a normal life after testing HIV positive, lack of HIV testing benefits due to sexual inactivity or having one sexual partner, fear of HIV test results, lack of trust in the health care system, no responsiveness to possible HIV symptoms and confidence to go get HIV tested. Five sub-themes were identified, namely, anticipated stigma, lack of trust in the HIV test results, the quality of counselling and bad treatment from health care facilitators, stressful pre- and post-test counselling, and more attention in HIV testing. The identified themes aim to explore students’ perceptions about HIV testing and the reasons that prevent them from testing for HIV. Key words: HIV testing, university students, barriers to HIV testing.M.A. (Psychology