Child Abuse Recognition and Related Factors among Korean Nursing Students

Objectives: This study measures nursing students' ability to recognize child abuse and identifies the factors related to varying levels of recognition. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, data were collected from 370 third and fourth year nursing students using a self-reported questionnaire during November 15-30, 2011. The measuring tool for child abuse recognition used in the study was developed by Ozasa (2011) and is composed of 44 items including physical, mental, and sexual abuse, and neglect. For data analysis, descriptive statistics, two sample t-tests, and regression analysis were evaluated with the SPSS/PC ver20.0 program. Results: Nursing students were concerned about child abuse(85.4%), but knew little about related laws and regulations(14.3%), and they had almost no formal education or training regarding how to recognize child abuse. They only 1.6% reported child abuse even if they encountered such incidents; however, they correctly recognized even infrequent incidents of child abuse. Recognition of sexual abuse ranked highest, while recognition of neglect ranked lowest. Those with higher levels of concern over child abuse showed higher recognition scores. Regression analysis revealed that physical abuse, mental abuse, and neglect had different related factors, while sexual abuse had none. Conclusion: Education and training on the subject of child abuse is strongly recommended in nursing curriculums so that nurses will be able to appropriately respond to and report suspected child abuse.