Daughters at Risk of Female Genital Mutilation: Examining the Determinants of Mothers’ Intentions to Allow Their Daughters to Undergo Female Genital Mutilation (2016)
This study is a Exploratory research regarding All FGM/C with the following characteristics:
Author(s): Pashaei Tahereh,Koen Ponnet,Maryam Moeeni,Maryam Khazaee-pool,and Fereshteh Majlessi
FGM/C Type(s): All
Health area of focus: None.
Objective: To explore factors associated with FGM behavior among Iranian mothers and their daughters
Study Population: mothers who had at least one daughter and lived in Ravansar
Findings: Attitude is the strongest predictor of mothers’ intentions to allow their daughters to undergo FGM,followed by subjective norms. Compared to younger mothers,older mothers have more positive attitudes toward FGM,perceive themselves as having more control over their behavior and demonstrate a greater intention to allow their daughter to undergo FGM. Furthermore,we found that less educated mothers and mothers living in rural areas had more positive attitudes toward FGM and feel more social pressure to allow FGM. The model accounts for 93 percent of the variance in the mothers’ intentions to allow their daughters to undergo FGM. Intervention programs that want to decrease FGM might focus primarily on converting mothers’ neutral or positive feelings toward FGM into negative attitudes and on alleviating the perceived social pressure to mutilate one’s daughter. Based on our findings,we provide recommendations about how to curtail mothers’ intentions to allow their daughters to undergo FGM.
Geographical coverage
Region(s):Southern Asia
Country(ies):Iran