“Women’s Mental Harassment’

Abstract This is the research report of “Women’s Mental Harassment’’ done by the second year psychology special students of the University of Perdeniya to test whether the Sinhala translation of the English inventory “Women’s Mental Harassment’’ suits and validates Sri Lankan society. Here, our group focused on urban and rural thirty married non working mentally abused women who were given the Sinhala translation of the English Inventory which consists of fifty eight questions to be answered using the direct format and this small research took about three months. Introduction Violence or harassment against women is increasing day by day all over the world. As media and researches done on violence or harassment against women prove in each and every society, culture and nation this physical and mental harassment against women happens in both developing and developed countries (Donovanid). Specially, here mental harassment is very dangerous as well as the physical harassment, as it leads to many family and social problems. Simply “mental harassment” means psychological harm or suffering, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or private life (Jones). In both developed and developing countries mental harassment against women has become a normal thing and as a developing country Sri Lanka also faces the same situation. Specially, harassment or violence against married women is highly spread. This is a sad and miserable situation that innocent women have to face with. As media and researches show the rate of the mental harassment of Sri Lankan married women has increased within the last two decades (Coomarasawamy). Specially, both urban and rural married women suffer a lot because of many family and social problems. Poverty, war, religion, some cultural and social rules and values, drunkenness of the husband, suspicion, problems within the family unit, extra marital affairs of the husband, marriage without family approval, problems of the wife regarding house hold work, financial problems, problems regarding the relationship with other members of the family, sexual problems, impatience of the husband, life style in a crowded place and the tension caused by it, wife being employed, problems regarding dowry are only few of such problems that Sri Lankan married women face with. In 1995, 189 governments including Sri Lanka gave a solemn promise to take action to prevent all forms of violence committed against women on a conference at Beijing in China (Suraweera). But the situation in Sri Lanka has not changed completely. The best example for this situation is the report prepared by the HRW organization in 2006 with regard to the situation in Six countries of the world. In the same, Sri Lanka has signed many declarations regarding harassment or violence against women. Sri Lanka entered into the United Nations convention regarding prevention of all types of ill treatment against women, in 1981 and in 1993, Sri Lanka has become a signatory to the Vienna declaration regarding the prevention of violence against women and in the same way, it has contributed to the Beijing declaration in 1995 and the action plan.(Karunanayaka, 2008). But the harassment against women still exists and the government has failed to stop it. Mental harassment cannot be detected and analyzed easily. It is not always reported as the physical harassment. However, this often occurs within a dwelling place. Therefore, mental violence or harassment against married women has become an issue that needs an immediate and definite solution. When trying to find solutions to this problem, better opportunities for bringing this problem to the attention of the society can be created by creating a public opinion on this matter with the participation of both men and women and increasing the awareness of this problem in the society. Though various researches have been done on physical harassment of married women, researches on mental harassment of married women are few and less and that matter led us to do this small research. Literature Review Though researches done on mental harassment against on women are few or less to some extent some investigations and researches have been done by some individuals, Sri Lankan government and some nongovernmental organizations. Namasivayam in 1950 presents details regarding mental harassment against women and in 1985, Gunasekara has done a small research on this topic and Jayaweera in 1991 and in 1998 has investigated about mental harassment against women. In the same way, reports of the National Committee on Women, the Ministry of Women’s Affairs. The Convention on The Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), Women and Media Collective, Sri Lanka’s Women’s Charter also clearly prove how serious is the mental harassment against women in Sri Lanka. Objectives of the Research The main objective of this research to test whether the Sinhala translation of the English inventory; “Women’s Mental Harassment’’ suits and validates Sri Lankan society. Other than the main objective, we thought that researches done on mental harassment on married women in Sri Lanka were few and less and that matter also led us to do this small research. Methodology Research Design Here, we have chosen experimental research design for our research. Techniques of gathering data Selected instrument (Questionnaire) We have selected Closed format questionnaire to structure our questions in the questionnaire which will save our money and time. By restricting the answer set, it is very easy to calculate the percentage and other hard statistical data. Actually women we chose for our research are very busy with their family works and with other activities though really they are non–working women. So here, the closed format questionnaire is very important. For an example, if we used the observation method to get accurate data, we would have to follow them always when they were engaging in their works and it might be very difficult to us to observe and in the same way, it might be a disturbance to our participants. But closed format questionnaire is easy to administer comparing to other methods. Procedure of Collecting Data *First we took the original English Inventory; “Women’s’ Mental Harassment.” *Then two students in our class translated it into Sinhala. *Then another two students in our class translated that Sinhala translation into English. *After that, one of our students compared the two translations with the original and it was edited as suitable. * Then, edited Sinhala translation and original one were shown to a university lecturer to check whether the Sinhala translation is on good condition and whether it can be understood by our participants. * After having completed the structuring questionnaire, we followed our time schedule too. The procedure was followed step by step as listed follow and the places where the data was collected were as follow. 1.From Nivitigala village of Ratnapura District in Sabaragamuwa Province. 2.From Dedigama village of Kegalla District in Western Province and 3.From Maniayamgama village of Kegalla District in Sabaragamuwa Province. *First one of our group members went to each and every chosen women participant when the husbands of those women participants were out of home, explained our purpose and got the their approval and permission and got a date to be met (Five group members covered the above mentioned three areas and only each and every group member went to participants alone). *On the appointed day, our group member went to their homes and gave the questionnaire to them fill as they like. *Our group member gave his or her telephone number to the participants who were unable to submit the questionnaire at the moment to contact him or her if they were not aware or not clear of any question. *Each and every group member took a card and mentioned the name, place, occupation, religion, age, ethnicity, and details whether urban or rural of our participants on those cards and in the same way, each and every questionnaire was given a mark not to be mixed with other questionnaires. *After two weeks of receiving their questionnaire back to us, our group member again went to those participants’ home and again presented the same questionnaire to check whether they have given us correct data. *After that, those questionnaires were also collected having given necessary time and our group member expressed his or her gratitude to participants. Size of sample: - 30 participants included five urban and five rural participants from Nivitigala village of Ratnapura District in Sabaragamuwa Province, five urban and five rural participants from Maniayamgama village of Kegalla District in Sabaragamuwa Province and five urban and five rural participants from Dedigama village of Kegalla District in Western Province. Findings and Data analysis. The following bar chart shows the data that our group got from the first collection of questionnaires. In findings and data analysis, we here hope to use both quantitative and qualitative methods as both of them are very important for our research. Actually when comparing comparatively the data we got for the first time from three villages, we can see that Nivitigala village and Dedigama village have less mental harassment on women than Maniyangama villge. Though both Nivitigala village and Dedigama village share data closely in occurrences of “doesn’t occur, rarely, generally, often, always,” in the “not relevant column,” Dedigama village surpasses Nivitigala village which says that for the participants in that village to some extent the questions mentioned in the questionnaire were not relevant. Interestingly, Maniyangama has a great value in the column “generally” which tells us that mental harassment on women is a general thing in that village. In the same way, in the columns “rarely, often and always” Maniyangama village has greater values than other two villages which again proves that mental harassment against on women in that village is high. The following bar chart shows the data that our group got from the second the collection of questioners Chart ii. When comparing the data chart ii with the data chart i we can see that there is not a considerable difference between the two charts. The following pie chart shows the data we collected both times and the difference of those data as a percentage. Chart iii. The difference of data as a percentage is 0.9900%. So when considering the data it is very clear that validity of our research is in a high position. Significance of the study Actually, our research is very helpful to our participants very well. The woman participants can understand their real life; the way how their husbands suppress them mentally and even physically, and to get a knowledge about human rights, to comprehend individual value and even if our participants are highly oppressed by their husbands they can get an idea of legal action because of this research. If this inventory is validated this particular research will be beneficial to people who study about women’s mental harassment, to understand women’s feelings and emotions, to government and non government organizations, institutes which interest on women’s mental harassment and even to counselors, psychiatrists, psychologists, doctors, university students, unmarried girls and to ordinary people to get knowledge about women’s mental harassment. The limitations of our study are listed as follow. • Happened to spend much time for this research. • Being unable to get a large sample. • Being an outsider may also limit what was revealed to us, that is, our group members were not be with them when the questionnaire was being filled and even they might not give correct data because of many factors. • Dislike of participants as the questionnaire was being too long. • Disturbances as from participant’s husbands. • Some participants were unable to understand some words and questions mentioned in the questionnaire. Ethical consideration The research have conducted was designed to have well-recognized ethics that acknowledged by everyone. Before, giving the questionnaire we explained how to fill it and told them not be afraid of and subjective in filling the questionnaire. In the clear sense, we did not insist them or forcibly make them uncomfortable and deceive them in filling. Likewise, we did not say anything that affects on their personality and mentality. In selecting sample we were not subjective, unfair discriminated, and biased to select our participants and we followed the method above mentioned. In occasions of collecting data, recording data, analyzing data, and communicating the results, we protected personal and private information of our participants. We maintained the confidentiality and privacy during the data was being collected, analyzed and after result was issued. Especially, in analyzing data, we encoded the ideas of intellectuals as theirs. Conclusion The research that we did to test whether the Sinhala translation of the English Inventory “Mental Harassment Against Women” suits and validates Sri Lankan society was successful. Though it is clear when looking at charts of participants’ responses which they gave on two occasions, there is no considerable difference and it shows that the validity of our research is high. But, attention must be given to the dislike of participants to fill the inventory because it is too long and participants being unable to understand some words and some questions mentioned in the questionnaire. So, it shows that we have to edit this Sinhala version again. So, those facts should be taken into consideration Time schedule:- 1. Translated original English inventory of Women’s Mental Harassment into Sinhala First week of May 2. Translated the Sinhala version into English again Second week of May 3. Compared the translated Sinhala and English versions with the original English Inventory. Third week of May 4. Showed the Sinhala translation and original English Inventory to a university lecturer and got his approval. Fourth week of May 5. Collecting data for the first time First week of June 6. Collecting data for the second time to test the validate Fourth week of June 7. Analyzing data First week of July 8. Submitting research report Second week of July References Alam, I., South Asian journal (March of 2011), Parkistan: Shadman Publishers. Corner, W., (2008), African and Asian studies (vol.4), USA: Brill Publishers. Donovan, P. (ed.), International family planning perspectives, USA: Guttmacher Institute. Jayaweera, S., Women in post independent Sri Lanka,(2002), Colombo 4: Vijitha Yapa Publications. Jones, E. & Flugel. J. C., (1950). The psychoanalytic study of the family. (8th ed.) London: The Hogarth Press Ltd. Kenkel, M. B.,(ed.), (2006), Professional psychology; Research and practice (vol.37), USA; American Psychological Association. Kumar, R., (2000), Violence against women, New Delhi: Anmol Publications. Mental Harrsment (2009, June 18). Retrieved July 10,2011,from PsychWiki: http://www.psychwiki.com/wiki/Mental Harassment. Vault, B.De.C. & Sayad, B.W., (1998), The marriage and family experience, United States: Wardsworth Publishers. Wasundar, L.W., (2000), Women surviving in situations of armed conflict, Colombo: Center for Women’s Research.