Health Belief Model-Oriented Training Intervention’s Impact on Prevention of Domestic Violence against Elderly Women: A quasi-experimental study

Background The majority of the accessible evidence on violence against women is focused on the group of women of reproductive age (from 15 to 49), and globally speaking, there is inadequate evidence on the patterns and types of violence against elderly women, while a better perception of the patterns and different dynamics of violence experienced by aged women is necessary in order to guarantee appropriate policy making or the implemented program’s outcomes, which can lead to conducting some behaviors in the senior women. Thus, the present study was developed and performed to outline the Impact of Health Belief Model-Oriented Training Intervention on the Prevention of Domestic Violence against Elderly Women referring to comprehensive rural health service centers located in Kharameh City in 2024. Material and Methods The present quasi-experimental study was conducted in 2024 on 140 aged females referring to comprehensive health centers in Kharameh city, Fars province. Cluster sampling method was applied and the subjects were allocated to two groups as experimental and control by simple random method (n = 70 in the experimental group and n = 70 in the control group). The data were collected by standard Health Belief Model (HBM) questionnaire completed by the control and experimental groups before and two months after the intervention. The training intervention consisted of 6 face-to-face HBM-focused sessions for violence prevention, which were held during two months for the experimental group. After entering the data into SPSS-27, they were analyzed by paired t-test, independent t-test, and Chi-squared test. Results The independent t-test results divulged that the pre-training intervention came up with no statistically significant difference between the intervention and control groups in terms of the mean score of knowledge, attitude, perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits, perceived barriers, cues for action, self-efficacy and behavior (P > 0.05), while the post-training intervention revealed a tangible difference between the HBM constructs in the experimental and control groups (P < 0.05). Conclusion The present study results indicated that the HBM-focused training program proved effective in preventing violent behaviors against aged women. Pursuant to this research, the HBM-focused training program promoted the establishment of susceptibility and severity towards violence by creating a connection between knowledge and attitude, and the elderly women identified the potential benefits and barriers and were able to build up their self-efficacy and behavior by adopting cues for action.