Research report: Understanding Views, Attitudes and Behavior Toward Gender Issues and Equality at HSU Viet Nam
On February 27, 2013 the Research and Society Center (GAS)
at Hoa Sen University (HSU) reported on their research findings entitled
“Understanding views, attitudes and behavior of HSU’s faculty/staff and
students toward gender equality in the family, at the workplace/school and in
society".
The Research team was comprised of four
individuals. They included:
- Thai Thi Ngoc Du, Director of GAS
- Doan Thi
Ngoc – GAS Research Specialist and Instructor
- Nguyen Thi
Nhan – Instructor, the General Education Program
- Phan Trinh
Hoang Da Thi – Instructor the General Education Program
Recently, the world has had growing
concerns about gender issues and gender equality, including Vietnam. For this
reason, the Research-Findings-Workshop on gender study attracted more than 50
participants from various disciplines. Included were researchers, gender
specialists, sociologists, social workers, faculty, students, and those
interested in gender equality inside and outside HSU. In addition, the research
team received many comments, constructive feedback, shared knowledge and
experience in order to revise or add more information to this final findings
report. In addition, several questions from the audience may have been helpful
in generating or expanding new research topics for the future.
The following major points
were presented:
1. Reasons for the research
topic
For more than two years, GAS–HSU has sponsored several gendered activities
to raise community awareness at HSU on its four campuses and of the general
public nationwide and worldwide by using various means of communication. The
initial means of communication was from HSU offering a Gender and Development
Course as an elective for all students that were managed by the General
Education Program. This was followed by HSU establishing the GAS center in
2010. Consequently GAS became known nationally and internationally through the
Web site http://gas.hoasen.edu.vn/en.
An e-newsletter is also released quarterly in Vietnamese, English, and French.
GAS subsequently combined previously published e-newsletter articles and
research journals into a printed book which is published yearly for students
and professionals to use as a reference. Twice a month Vietnamese readers
nationwide and worldwide also receive a separate collection of articles on
gender equality and women’s issues from various news sources. Last but not
least, in addition to conducting research, GAS organizes yearly gendered
academic activities and discussions through seminars, workshops, and
conferences in cooperation with Vietnamese and International experts, scholars,
and researchers.
It is critical for faculty and students together with HSU, on the journey for advancement of gender equality, to carry out research in order to understand their views, concerns, attitudes, and behaviors through gendered perspectives in relationship with family, workplace, and society. An appropriate assessment of gendered dimensions is the foundation that assists GAS in developing their plans, make decisions on contents and forms of operation, these are in accordance with the level of awareness and expectations of the HSU community and society on Gender and Development. Most importantly, the research results aim to contribute knowledge and discipline, which may be utilized to advocate for HSU internal policy changes.
Research goals
The research
has four major goals to need to be found. They include: understanding the
views, attitude, and behavior, by the HSU faculty and staff and students (as a
unit), on the roles and positions of men and women in the context of family,
workplace /school, and society; understanding as a unit the views, attitude,
and behavior on issues related to roles and positions of men and women in
the context of family, workplace/school and society that need to be changed;
understanding as a unit their views on what is gender equality and what is a
family, a workplace /a school, and a society that has gender equality; and
understanding as a unit their expectations and concerns on gender
activities in school.
Research methodology
The study was carried out from December 2011 to December
2012. The research data collected was qualitative. In-depth interview and
focus-group techniques were used to collect the data. The knowledge, attitude,
practice (KAP) survey model was employed to evaluate HSU’s faculty and staff
and students’ views, attitudes, beliefs and practices toward gender equality
and in relation to the KAP factors.
Research participants
The total number of subjects participating in this blinded
study was 82 GV-NV and SV Hoa Sen University. The team interviewed 20
faculty and staff members (8 males and 12 females), 22 students (6 males, 16
females) and held four focus group sessions which included 40 students (20
male, 20 female), 10 in each group (5 males and 5 females). To ensure anonymity,
each participant was identified by a code number.
Research results
In general, the faculty/staff and students had a certain
understanding of gender equality and were able to identify the benefits of
gender equality for the family and society. All participants agreed that
Vietnamese women are still disadvantaged in education and employment and that
there is still pervasive violence against women in the family. Gender
socialization process of individuals is strongly influenced by education of the
family and the behaviors of their parents and grandparents as well as the
surrounding environment. In addition, the results showed that the stereotyped
roles for men and women, the misunderstanding of true gender equality, and the
lack of support for women in leadership are still deeply ingrained by culture,
education and the patriarchal system.
Audience input into the
report
Following presentation of the study results, the audience was asked for input in the form of questions, audience response and comments.
Question #1,part 1: Why was the term
"sexuality" not used correctly in Vietnamese, which could have
resulted in a misunderstanding? This happens in social science disciplines,
even in the mass media as well as in textbooks.
Question #1,part 2: Why was statistical probability not
considered when analyzing the results reported and why were there no
comparisons made between Vietnamese women and Asian or Western women?
- Response #1 from
another member of the audience: It doesn’t matter what we call the term
“sexuality” in Vietnamese. To me, “Tính dục” or “Tình dục”, both mean the
same and can be used interchangeably.
- Response #2 from a member of the study team: In fact the two
meanings are used interchangeably; therefore, the problem how to use it
consistently will take a lot of paper and ink, amid arguments from
different stakeholders. Even the research community has raised the
question and debated on it, yet there has been no final agreement. Social
science scholars should have more debates and discussions on this in the
future. However, this was not the key construct in the research, so we did
not define the term “sexuality” but only restated the information that
participants shared.
Regarding the issue of statistical probability, it was not within the scope
of our research, therefore, "qualitative” rather than “quantitative”
methods were employed, and consequently statistical probability was not
applicable as the audience would expect. This was only a small descriptive
study to understand the dimensions related to the views, attitude, and behavior
of 20 HSU faculty/staff and 22 students and four focus groups. We narrowed our
topic and the number of participants within HSU because of financial and human
resource limitations.
These days, researchers are more likely to utilize qualitative methods in
their research projects because it is useful for exploring and understanding
more profound factors of problems, especially topics that seek to describe and
analyze the perceptions, attitudes and behaviors of people and groups of people
from the researchers’ perspective. The study team chose the qualitative route
because research strategy is very flexible, dialectic and it allowed detection
of important gender inequality themes. What was presented at the workshop was
extremely short and solely key findings were reported. There is still a
substantial amount of information that was not immediately explored, therefore,
exchange and feedback from participants is important which will help the team
additional information to the team’s final report.
- Response #3: The team said
that these are very good questions and explained that it is antiscientific
and not acceptable to dramatize research outcomes because we are female
researchers. The information was collected from both male and female
participants and the research team analyzed their responses on a blinded
basis. If anyone has studied research methods, they should know the pros
and cons of qualitative methods. Because the objective of the study
was to understand views, knowledge, attitudes, and participant behavior on
gender equality, the team employed a qualitative, in-depth study of small
numbers of cases to seek a trend toward describing patterns and
identifying themes rather than to explain causes or test a hypothesis.
Usually when conducting research, there is a theoretical framework for
analyzing problems. However, based on an inductive method, we collected
the data and used the KAP survey model (knowledge, attitudes, practice) to
identify the existence of gender inequality in the family,
workplace/school, and society as follows:
Question #2: The research team was all women,
therefore, when the experience of the participants was described, was the team
biased or was there a trend toward describing the role of women as a tragedy
and depicting women as victims of gender inequality? When the problem is
reversed, there is inequality for men. For example, when obtaining a divorce,
in 95% of the cases, the court decides that the children should be in the
custody of the mother, so is this not inequality for men regarding marriage
laws? One more issue, in the research, what theory did you use to explain the
problems?
- Response #1: That is a
good point a member of the audience responded. The above questions needed
to be addressed in the study. However, she said that the research team is
professionally trained in research and gender perspectives; therefore,
when conducting research, they must conform to gender research standards
such as: ethical issues, objectivity, value free, etc. She suggested that
whenever the results are published on the web sites, books or newspapers,
the team should provide the study questionnaire in order to assist the
audience in assessing the data collected based on the objectives of the
research.
- Response #2: In terms of divorce cases, another member of the
audience argued that he disagreed with the issue raised. Marriage and
family laws in other countries are generally the same as in Vietnam in
that the mother has the right to bring up the children, especially when
the children are under 10 years of age. The father cannot raise the
children because of breastfeeding. The court takes the various factors
under great consideration to make decisions that are best for the child.
So, this should not be considered discrimination or prejudice toward men.
- Response #3: The team said that these are very good questions
and explained that it is antiscientific and not acceptable to dramatize
research outcomes because we are female researchers. The information
was collected from both male and female participants and the research team
analyzed their responses on a blinded basis. If anyone has studied
research methods, they should know the pros and cons of qualitative
methods. Because the objective of the study was to understand views,
knowledge, attitudes, and participant behavior on gender equality, the
team employed a qualitative, in-depth study of small numbers of cases to
seek a trend toward describing patterns and identifying themes rather than
to explain causes or test a hypothesis. Usually when conducting research,
there is a theoretical framework for analyzing problems. However, based on
an inductive method, we collected the data and used the KAP survey model
(knowledge, attitudes, practice) to identify the existence of gender
inequality in the family, workplace/school, and society as follows:
- The research team also utilized
a feminism perspective that “the majority of women in society are still
disadvantaged compared with men” to analyze that whether women, even in the
middle-class in this study, are still disadvantaged in the family,
workplace/school, and society.
- A Patriarchal system or traditional Confucius culture are still great
barriers to women's liberation and advancement although they seem to be aware
of the issues of gender inequality in the family and in society. A patriarchal
mentality also creates a great deal of unnecessary pressure on men and leads to
consequences where in the male vulnerable groups are unequally treated.
Therefore, the approach to gender equality should be to involve both men and
women.
- An awareness and participation by men will contribute to accelerating the
process of gender equality. A participant commented that "men in
general have not as yet evolved especially in the family sphere”. Now
that gender equality has become a common strategy for Vietnam and the world,
men must accept gender equality in society. However, within the family they do
not want to give up their dominance.
- This has led to another pressure on women: their "dual role".
Intelligent women are faced with the paradox that they were able to achieve
equality at work and in society, however, within their families they continue
to experience the pressures of inequality and stereotype. For example, if their
families are broken up or if well-educated women are unable to get a husband,
for whatever reason, the family will assume that women intellectuals are
successful in society, but not in the family or they prefer to work rather than
have a family. Moreover, the family relationship is not based heavily on
reasoning and principles as in the workplace or in society; therefore, women
have to find a balance between work and family. In particular, they need to be
subtle, ingenious in how to behave and pay attention to all emotional and
psychological factors of their husband and their relatives.
Question #3: In the results reported, the study
team referred to violence but apparently only to physical violence against
women; however, there is violence against men as well. In fact aren’t there are
many other forms of violence?
- Response #1: A member of
the audience stated that mental violence such as whining, begrudging,
grumbling, neglecting, or being indifferent with each other, can be
equally used in the same manner by males or females, therefore, we cannot
say this is an example of inequality. However, regarding physical
violence, men have the advantage of usually being physically stronger than
women. It is rare that a woman is able to use her physical strength to
kick, slap, or beat their spouses.
- Response #2: The team
responded that it is true there are many forms of domestic violence
including physical, emotional, sexual, and social violence. Due to
the brief report, they were not able to present all the details. The
findings did show that two-thirds of the participants witnessed physical
and mental violence against women in their neighborhood or on the news,
and one-third of respondents were victims of violence in the family. The
issues of physical and mental violence are found in the study. Emotional
violence is defined as silent or threatening behavior, cursing, and
indifference. Physical violence refers to behaviors such as, but not
limited to, scratching or biting, grabbing, choking, shaking,
hair-pulling, slapping, hitting, use of a weapon (knife, or other object),
use of restraints or one's body, size, or strength against another person.
Physical violence directly impairs the victim's physical integrity and
often entails health and psychological consequences as well.
The findings exhibited many causes of violence, mainly about money, economic
hardship, business loss, jealousy, lack of communication, the provocation of a
spouse, lack of respect for each other, or the traditional Confucius culture of
the husband, or because of various stimulants such as alcohol, drugs, etc.
However, the deepest causes of gender inequality and the feudal ideology are
ingrained in the minds of many people. For example, a wife is obsessed by her mental
violence and feels insecure because of her husband’s quiet control: "When
I'm using my computer, my husband tip-toes up behind me and peeks at the
screen, which startles me and makes me feel unsafe. He asked me why I am
startled. Is it because I do something bad [GNV6F, p. 8 ]? ” Or in other cases
a husband or father batters his wife and children. One of the participants
shared that: "my father is both verbally aggressive and is dominant in
behavior which makes us anxious and depressed. He did batter my mom but the
consequences were not serious [GNV16M, p.2].” All but one of the physical
violence cases reported did not lead to serious consequences; the one exception
was a case of an injured eardrum.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), statistics on domestic
violence in 1998 indicated that 95% of women suffer physical violence and only
5% of men are battered. The majority of batterers are men, including husbands,
significant others, former husbands, former spouses, or acquaintances. The results
of this analysis also showed that men who abuse their wives and children are
often in the dominant position in terms of physical and mental strengths and
authority. Domestic violence often correlates with the families that have
economic hardship, insufficient education, illnesses, joblessness, and alcohol
addiction. However, this does not mean that rich or intellectual families do
not experience violence. Moreover, there are various forms of violence that is
hardly detected, for example, violence between parents and children is often a
reflection of the parents who think “spare the rod, spoil the child” or other
acts of insulting, humiliating, controlling or prohibiting their wives and
children from thinking for themselves (Le Thi Quy & Dang Vu Canh Linh,
2007).
Question #4: If men do not
have a stable job or have a low income, they will be stressed, suppressed, and
stereotyped because they don’t meet expectations of family and society.
Is this normal in society?
Response: According to the team, gender bias occurs for both
men and women in society, but women suffer more gender biases. Gender
stereotypes bring bad things to anyone. Bias against men comes from the
stereotypical roles that society assigns to them: men must be strong, men must
be the breadwinners, men must be the primary responsible person in the family
supporting the entire family and thereby making society more stable. If a woman
is unemployed that is acceptable in society, however, if a man s jobless he
becomes stressed out and feels inferior. This is gendered bias, however, it is
not normal equality. At the
present, women have better conditions to develop their ability and take on more
responsibilities in the family and in society while traditional stereotyping
roles have created tremendous pressure on men if they are not the same or
better than their wives regarding status and income. So if we push back the old
ways of thinking, everyone will be equally treated. Men will be happier and
less likely to be biased or controlling.
Question #5, part 1: Did the team members focus more on the disadvantages of men or that of women?
Question #5, part 2: Did the study include only
women?
Comments in addition to responses to question 5: In addition
to the two questions asked, a member of the audience added that the research
results will help her clarify problems when disseminating gender issues in her
community. The research subjects were middle class people but they still
experienced gender inequality. It seems to her that these problems have
been in existence for a long time. Gender experts and other people have
advocated for gender equality in society, though family women do not dare to
ask for equality. Very few women dare to sacrifice their family happiness in
order to fight for gender equality. They must wait and decide whether to choose
family and their children if they marry a patriarchal husband. They must be
tender, subtle, and patient with their husband in order to maintain happy
marriages. This is an extremely serious math problem to solve and it is
difficult to disseminate gender issues and gender equality to these people in
the communities. In addition, it seemed to her that the movement of gender
equality is declining compared with the early 90s. Especially stereotypes in the
mass media drag this movement down, which may make gender experts and
individuals engaging in gender works confused and they may not know how
to take back their proactive positions. Her last comments were that she hopes
GAS will utilize the findings to construct activities on gender equality and
gender issues to raise the general public’s awareness, and that they will
conduct further research in order to find better solutions to promote gender
issues and gender equality.
Answer #1: Another member in the audience did not agree
with the argument that “the movement of gender equality is now declining”. He
stressed that the gender equality movement in general is rising and moving
toward an even more positive direction. “People need to look more broadly especially
women need to ask for, fight for, and stand up for women’s rights. Don’t wait
for the State! Don’t wait for men to change! Regarding the phenomenon of rape
in India, women stood up to demand equality and justice. Or in terms of women
in leadership, Thailand has a female prime minister, the Phillippines and South
Korea both have a female president and Burma is going to have a female
president soon. When will I see a female president in Vietnam?”
Answer #2: On
behalf of the team, Dr. Thai Thi Ngoc Du said that today many men and women
have recognized the importance of gender equality, especially the values
between human beings. Unfortunately due to culture, social construction, and
family hindering the gender equality progress, many women have to choose to
continue their traditional roles in order to maintain a harmonious family. The
results of this study clearly demonstrate that although the research
participants are aware of gender inequality, it is not easy to implement gender
equality in the family. As for the mass media, they are not yet doing their
part fully. There are not many articles that enable readers to understand about
true gender equality and its benefits of gender equality to social sustainable
development.
Question #6: A member of the
audience commented that, in fact, people do not truly understand what gender
equality is and they don’t ask experts who study fundamental scientific
knowledge and know more about gender issues and gender equality. Therefore,
they usually obtain information that is irrational, not reliable, and
non-professional which results in the misunderstanding of gender issues and
gender inequality. If possible, could GAS establish a forum to answer inquiries
related to gender equality and discuss gender issues with their readers? In
this form GAS would be able to guide the general public toward gender based
knowledge and provide them with scientific evidence so that they may understand
gender and gender equality in a proper and professional manner.
Response:
This is a good suggestion for GAS to consider. Perhaps GAS will develop such a
forum in the future.
Question
#7: Another member of the audience fully expressed her admiration on
gender equality activities of GAS, HSU. She commented that she will learn from
HSU how to set up a gender equality center at her university. She is an expert
on gender and she studies “the role of women in the 20th century”. Her findings
have determined gender inequality in relation to language. The phrase “phụ
nữ” meaning “women" reveals the low status and second class citizen of
women in the family and in society. In our daily discourse between husband and
wife, women address themselves as “em” as “young sister” to men as “anh” as
“big brother-the superior”. This is hierarchy in everyday language and it is
not fair. In addition, she asked the team how far gender equality has
progressed after 30 years and is it commonplace as people say that women who
ask for gender equality are “those women who hold the light running before a
car”.
Response: Both men and women have been oriented
toward values such as respect, harmony and equality. For more than 30 years,
Vietnamese women have achieved certain progress in education a higher
percentage of leaders at all levels, the right to choose their loved ones for
marriage. However, if there would be less barriers regarding policy,
traditional cultures and slow social economic development, women would have
already obtained more advancement. Middle-class women in Vietnam seem to be
less interested in gender equality for the disadvantaged. This is very
different from Western women.
Ending workshop comments: A member of the audience who
works on gender and environment issues shared his opinions on the findings. He
commented that he was impressed as well as surprised by the report. “Violence
against women is still pervasive even in rich families. This report clearly
stated the research objectives and research methods as well as specific
techniques. The purpose of the study also made it very clear regarding the
scope of the research and that the research subjects were HSU faculty and staff
as well as students. Therefore, the results are reliable and valid for the
gender discipline, especially for the students who have studied the gender and
development course. These students surely have a better understanding and solid
arguments on gender issues and gender equality. These students may also have
better opportunities to find their future jobs in non-government organizations
such as UNESCO, United Nations, World Bank. In fact, the gap in gender
awareness and gender equality of the Vietnamese people in general, and the
youth in particular, compared with the youth of other countries is large.
Therefore, there is high demand of gender training and research. During this
modernization and global integration era, gender equality is one of the key
criteria in all international projects because it advances not only the status
of women, it also enhances social sustainable development. In Vietnam, women
are still in a disadvantaged position, yet so are many women in other
countries. Large companies such as IBM and Microsoft often offer a job to
a female rather than to a male if they both have the same qualifications and
ability. This priority criterion is because on average women are still more
disadvantaged than men.
Finally, the information in the research report needs to be rearranged
into clear categories and GAS should also expand the number of research
participants and utilize both quantitative and qualitative research methods in
the future. If research results in information that can be applied to policy
change at HSU. The commentator thought that these were the most successful
study results to-date and that any further studies should be targeted in the
same direction.
The workshop ended more than an hour late which indicated that the workshop
was a huge success. On behalf of the team Dr. Thai Thi Ngoc Du sincerely
thanked all participants because of giving their precious support, time, and
valuable shared experiences on the research topic and GAS activities.
By Doan Thi Ngoc
