An Examination of the Opinions of the University Students About Feminism and Gender Roles

Gender discrimination adversely affected women in all areas of social life, especially in the fields of education, work, marriage and family life. Feminism has emerged to draw attention to the these impacts of gender discrimination and to reduce it’s negative consequences. Social transformation is necessary to ensure gender justice. One of the important steps for achieving this transformation is to educate the youth and increase their awareness. This study was conducted with the aim to determine Dumlupinar University, School of Health students’ opinions on feminism and gender roles. The population of this study consisted of 1293 students. The sample was comprised of 846 students who accepted to participate in the study. Data were collected through a questionnaire and analyzed with percentiles, KruskalWalls and Mann-Whitney U-Tests. 43.3% of students defined feminism as “a style of thought that advocates women are more superior than men” and 31.9% of them as “a style of thought that advocates the equity of social opportunity”. Male students were found to have more traditional opinions on gender roles related to work, social, marriage and family life. This study revealed that male students had more conventional opinions in the fields of working and married life while male and female students had egalatirian opinions in the propositions about social life and family life. Besides, the results of the study revealed that the opinions of students on gender roles related to work, social, marriage and family life exhibited statistically significant differences among the departments for all of the statements given. It was observed that midwifery students had more egalitarian views. Also, it was determined that upper class students had more egalitarian opinions. As a result of our study, it was seen that university students still had a traditional perspective on social gender roles. According to the results of the questionnaire we can state that the youth do not understand feminism with all its aspects and digest it. Therefore, the awareness of the university students about feminism and gender should be increased. The establishment of student societies advocating gender equity in universities is also considered to be useful.