Child physical abuse: Prevalence, risk factors and risk taking behavior among secondary school students aged 12 - 17 years in Dar es salaam, Tanzania.

Abstract

Background Child abuse, especially its definition, incidence and management, is difficult to comprehend. Perceptions of what constitutes child abuse have differed with time and culture. Practices that are now considered abusive have been accepted in the past as the normal exercise of parental rights, as economic necessity or as appropriate disciplinary measures. The 2009 Tanzania Violence against Children Study (VAC) is the first national survey of violence against children which showed almost three quarters of both male and female children have experienced physical violence before the age of 18 by an adult or intimate partner. However, information regarding child physical abuse among children in Tanzania is limited and thus this study will provide more informative knowledge that will help in covering the gap. Broad Objective To determine the prevalence of Child Physical Abuse (CPA) and risk factors among secondary school children between 12-17 years of age in Dar es Salaam Region, Tanzania. Methodology This is a descriptive cross sectional study that involved randomly selected children aged 12 to 17 years attending secondary schools from June –December, 2012. Self administered questionnaires were used for data collection. Data was cleaned and analysis was done using SPSS version 16. Frequency distribution and two way tables were used to summarize the data and X2 and Fisher’s exact test were used to determine the association between independent and dependent categorical variables. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression were further used to examine the factors associated with CPA Results The study enrolled 340 secondary students out of which 167 (49.11%) were male students. Out of these 191 (56.18%) experienced an incident of CPA the commonest being slapped or pushed (51.80%) and least common being threatened or use of weapon against vii them 30 (9.15%). Having older age,caretaker who supports corporal punishment and a parent who has history of being abused was significantly associated with occurrence of CPA. Among those who experienced CPA it was only 25.65% who reported the incidence to anyone about it. Alcohol use was less frequent among students who had not experienced CPA than the ones who experienced abuse. Conclusion CPA is common accounting 56.18% among secondary school students in Dar es Salaam and has negative impacts among those subject to violence. Recommendation Civic education with regards to children’s rights to be given to the community so that it increases the awareness on CPA and prevents its complications. Further studies are needed to address all the factors affecting CPA in order to formulate interventions and thus prevent its occurrences.