Domestic Violence from the Perspective of Students at Faculty of Health and Social Sciences of University of South Bohemia

The diploma thesis deals with the issue of domestic violence. At present, we speak about domestic violence more often, however, education is always a significant benefit, because stereotypical assumptions still remain in our society. They are often one of the obstacles which result in the impossibility to eliminate this socially pathological phenomenon. In the theoretical part of the thesis I describe the current status, forms, signs, progress, and the most common myths and prejudices of the public on the issue of domestic violence. In conclusion of the theoretical part I focus on prevention of socially pathological phenomena, and helping the victims. For this diploma work were established the following three hypotheses: H1: "Students at University of South Bohemia perceive the aggressor as the initiator of domestic violence." H2: "Students at University of South Bohemia perceive the aggressor as an uneducated person." H3: "Students at University of South Bohemia are convinced that domestic violence is more frequent with another ethnicity." In the empirical part I characterize the selected group. The research involved a total of 512 students. They include 450 women and 62 men. They were the students of Bachelor's and Master's study programmes of the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences at University of South Bohemia, in full-time and extramural form of study, and different age categories. The research was lead by the method of quantitative research, using a questionnaire survey with the semantic differential. Students had the opportunity to write down their positive or negative view of the victim and the offender or to remain impartial. The aim of the thesis was to find out the opinions and attitudes of students attending Faculty of Health and Social Sciences at University of South Bohemia to the victim and perpetrators of domestic violence. Most commonly, the students perceive the victim as a submissive, introverted, timid woman, who is not satisfied with this situation. They perceive the perpetrator as a dominant individual, who tends to jealousy. The stated hypothesis H1 has been confirmed. Hypotheses H2 and H3 have not been confirmed, and as a result, the alternative hypotheses have been accepted