HIV/AIDS knowledge, attitudes and behaviors assessment of Chinese students: a questionnaire study

The objective of this study was to assess students' knowledge, attitudes and practices on HIV and AIDS. A questionnaire was administered to a cross section of 259 Chinese undergraduates. Respondents were asked to provide information about knowledge and attitudes about HIV/AIDS. Study results indicated that the majority of undergraduates had a moderate level of HIV and AIDS knowledge, acceptance and attitudes towards people with HIV and AIDS. Boys had more acceptance and positive attitudes towards people with HIV and AIDS than girls. Students majoring in medicine performed better (more knowledgeable and accepting) than non-medical students. Differences between students with various monthly expenditures were found-- 6.2% of students had 3-5 sexual partners which has rarely been found in Chinese students; most students did not know HIV VCT centers and most students did not show their confidence for controlling of HIV and AIDS in China. In conclusion, students' knowledge about HIV/AIDS was uneven. A peer educational program to talk about self esteem, healthy sexual attitudes, being human-accepting and loving should be developed in the near future.     

Young people's knowledge, beliefs and attitudes about HIV/AIDS: a review of research

This paper reviews recent British research on young people'sknowledge and beliefs about HIV infection and AIDS. An examinationof the findings of surveys conducted in different parts of thecountry reveals that most young people are aware of the majortransmission routes: sexual intercourse without a condom andsharing needles. However, many young people are unsure aboutthe mechanisms of transmission and prevention. For example,there is concern about casual transmission. AIDS continues tobe associated with promiscuous rather than unsafe behaviourand AIDS related stigma is prevalent. Perceptions of severityand vulnerability appear to be critical in influencing behaviouralintentions and behaviour. In discussing the implications ofthese findings for health education, the paper examines thelimitations of data obtained by questionnaires. The contributionof semi-structured questionnaires and interviews are consideredand recommendations are made for further research in the area.     

Medical students and AIDS: knowledge, attitudes and implications for education.

Second year medical students at a large midwestern university were surveyed about their attitudes regarding AIDS. Results indicated: (1) students with homosexual and/or HIV-positive friends were significantly more tolerant toward AIDS patients, (2) over half the students believed that treating AIDS patients may be hazardous and that their education had not prepared them to treat these patients safely, (3) one-third believed they had the right to refuse to treat AIDS patients, and (4) AIDS-phobia was significantly associated with homophobia. These data suggest that medical educators may need to help students overcome AIDS-phobia before some students will be able to incorporate instruction about AIDS since AIDS-phobia may inhibit this learning. Didactic instruction must be coupled with modeling by educators of non-prejudicial attitudes and strict adherence to medical professionalism.     

The impact of an intervention to change health workers' HIV/AIDS attitudes and knowledge in Nigeria: a controlled trial

The aim of the study was to improve health workers' skills and confidence in dealing with patients with HIV disease and increase attention to patients' human rights. A longitudinal controlled trial was carried out in which one Nigerian state served as the intervention site and the adjacent state served as the control site for an intervention and dissemination of training in clinical management, health education, and attitudinal change toward patients with HIV disease. The intervention group n=1072, control group n=480.Following initial questionnaire-defining focus groups, nurses, laboratory technologists and physicians in all base hospitals in the intervention state were trained by influential role models who attended the initial training. Data were collected in all sites pre-training and 1 y later. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis controlling for baseline data, and orthogonal factor analysis to define scales were used. Data showed significant positive changes after 1 y in the intervention group on perception of population risk assessment, attitudes and beliefs about people with HIV disease, less fear and more sympathy for and responsibility toward HIV patients, and an increase in self-perceived clinical skills. There was increased willingness to treat and teach colleagues about people with HIV. Clinician fear and discrimination were significantly reduced, and the climate of fear that was associated with HIV was replaced with a professional concern. There was increased understanding of appropriate psychosocial, clinical and human rights issues associated with HIV treatment and prevention. This intervention, targeting health workers in an entire state and using HIV/AIDS information, role modeling, diffusion of training and discussions of discrimination and human rights, significantly affected the perception of risk groups and behaviors, perceived skills in treatment and counseling, reduced fears and increased concern for people with HIV disease, and improved the climate of treatment and prevention of HIV disease compared with a control state.     

HIV/AIDS and community conflict in Nigeria: implications and challenges

This paper discusses how HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and mitigation activities and funding for such work can lead to community conflict. The central role of communities in combating HIV/AIDS is widely agreed, with the contributions of social capital networks and civil society seen as pivotal; a rights-based approach to HIV/AIDS activities is considered essential. Yet experiences from a UK Department for International Development funded project in Nigeria suggest that greater critical attention must be given to the impacts and effects of HIV/AIDS on communities, and the ways in which conflict can develop, emerge and be sustained, resulting in severe breakdown of social cohesion and reduction or cessation of HIV/AIDS activities. It is argued here that conflict can be fuelled by the different priorities and perceptions of community members and groups vis-à-vis those of development organisations, and by the impact of funds on often desperately poor communities. Case studies analyse the development of the conflict, failed attempts at resolution, and two post-conflict project interventions whose design and implementation were informed by its experiences and outcome. The paper concludes by considering the potential input of participatory approaches, community psychology and change management in the development and implementation of HIV/AIDS interventions specifically so as to reduce potential for conflict. Its intention is to contribute to the debate on how best to implement genuinely community-based and managed HIV/AIDS interventions.     

Masculinity and HIV disclosure among heterosexual South African men: implications for HIV/AIDS intervention

Relationships and constructions of masculinity are central to understanding the process of male HIV disclosure, which is an important step towards accessing HIV-related services. Data from in-depth interviews and focus-group discussions with 23 HIV-positive, self-identified heterosexual, Black South African men were used to explore the disclosure process and how this process was negotiated in the context of constructions of masculinity. Of these men, 20 had disclosed to one or more persons, with partners and siblings being the preferred confidants. Disclosure was dependent on the acceptance of HIV status, perceived support and healthy relationships with others, HIV counselling and participation in educational and training activities. Non-disclosure was explained as a result of stigma, fear of rejection, discrimination, a lack of healthy relationships with others and lack of access to suitable disclosure strategies. Negative perceptions of HIV and hegemonic conceptions of masculinity hindered men from disclosing and seeking health services. Many men, however, managed to renegotiate their masculine identities to become responsible, knowledgeable HIV-positive individuals, protecting their families and becoming community educators. Findings suggest the need to consider gendered, contextual, skills-building/income-generating and guided interventions to promote male HIV disclosure and service uptake.     

Masculinity and HIV disclosure among heterosexual South African men: implications for HIV/AIDS intervention

Relationships and constructions of masculinity are central to understanding the process of male HIV disclosure, which is an important step towards accessing HIV-related services. Data from in-depth interviews and focus-group discussions with 23 HIV-positive, self-identified heterosexual, Black South African men were used to explore the disclosure process and how this process was negotiated in the context of constructions of masculinity. Of these men, 20 had disclosed to one or more persons, with partners and siblings being the preferred confidants. Disclosure was dependent on the acceptance of HIV status, perceived support and healthy relationships with others, HIV counselling and participation in educational and training activities. Non-disclosure was explained as a result of stigma, fear of rejection, discrimination, a lack of healthy relationships with others and lack of access to suitable disclosure strategies. Negative perceptions of HIV and hegemonic conceptions of masculinity hindered men from disclosing and seeking health services. Many men, however, managed to renegotiate their masculine identities to become responsible, knowledgeable HIV-positive individuals, protecting their families and becoming community educators. Findings suggest the need to consider gendered, contextual, skills-building/income-generating and guided interventions to promote male HIV disclosure and service uptake.     

Adolescents' knowledge and attitudes concerning HIV infection and HIV-infected persons: how a survey and focus group discussions are suited for researching adolescents' HIV/AIDS knowledge and attitudes

The purpose of this article is to examine how two different corpora of material are suited for researching the sexuality of youth on the basis of material gathered via a structured questionnaire (N = 1183, response rate 87%) and via eight focus group discussions (FGDs), and to investigate the knowledge and opinions of adolescents at the age of 15 years about HIV infection and HIV-infected persons. Both boys and girls showed a good level of knowledge about HIV infection and AIDS. While their level of knowledge was good, their attitude was that the threat of an HIV infection was not a personal issue. Furthermore, negative attitudes to those having HIV/AIDS became more pronounced the more socially distant the infected person was to the respondent. The FGDs presented a more sceptical view of the attitudes of adolescents than the survey, while the knowledge about HIV infection and AIDS was the same regardless of the research method. In the FGDs, girls discussed the topics more extensively than boys, they used longer sentences, there was spontaneous discussion within the groups and the participants commented on each other's opinions. Boys were often content with short dichotomous responses and the interviewers had to qualify the responses with supplementary questions.     

HIV/AIDS knowledge and attitudes among alcohol and drug abusers in Egypt

The aim of this study was to assess knowledge, attitudes and practice towards HIV/AIDS among alcohol and drug abusers and the effect of health education (HE) on their knowledge and attitudes. Participants were 265 substance abusers, recruited from 8 addiction rehabilitation centers. A base line study preceding HE was done using a questionnaire composed of five sections. Three scores were developed to assess HIV/AIDS related knowledge. The base line study indicates that addicts with good knowledge scores > or =75%) regarding modes of transmission were significantly higher among males than females. About 70% of the addicts had negative attitudes towards dealing with HIV/AIDS patients, while 55.5% felt sympathy for them. Eleven percent of the injection drug abusers were sharing needle with others, while 38% of the participating females were previously convicted of prostitution. Logistic analysis showed that high level of education was the best predictive variable for good knowledge scores (> or =75%). Evaluation of the health education program revealed a highly significant increase in the knowledge scores among both males and females compared to the pretest scores. An increase in the percentages of male and female addicts with improved attitudes towards HIV/AIDS patients was also noted after HE. So, HE was found to be a successful tool in improving the knowledge and attitudes of substance abusers towards HIV/AIDS.     

Survey of HIV/AIDS knowledge and attitudes of Kuwaiti family physicians

OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to explore Kuwaiti family physicians' attitudes and knowledge about HIV/AIDS. METHODS: One hundred and sixty-two Kuwaiti family physicians (95 females and 67 males) from all four health catchment areas have completed a 30-item self-administered questionnaire to measure HIV/AIDS-related attitudes and knowledge. RESULTS: Knowledge was lacking in areas dealing with HIV-related neuropsychiatric complications and other issues concerning HIV/AIDS, special populations and range of normal sexuality. The majority of physicians expressed negative attitudes toward homosexuality and about AIDS patients in general. Eighty-three per cent of Kuwaiti family physicians would opt out of treating AIDS patients. More than half of the physicians would avoid coming into social contact with HIV-seropositive persons. No significant difference was found for the total knowledge and attitude scores for gender. CONCLUSION: The results of this survey revealed that even in the second decade of the AIDS epidemic, some Kuwaiti family physicians continue to have a lack of proper knowledge about HIV and harbour negative attitudes toward AIDS patients. There is a need to promote an AIDS education early in the medical internship training years which addresses many underlying socio-cultural factors.     

Latinas and HIV/AIDS risk factors: implications for harm reduction strategies

OBJECTIVES: We examined risk factors for HIV infection among Puerto Rican and Mexican American women aged 15 through 44 years. METHODS: We used data from the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth. Analyses focused on the relation between sex role attitudes, sex education, anxiety, and consistent condom use. RESULTS: Nearly 60% of Puerto Rican and Mexican American women received no sex education from parents. Twenty-one percent of Puerto Rican and 38.3% of Mexican American women reported no sex education in schools. Women with some sex education in school, less than 13 years of education, or higher sex role attitude scores were more likely than other women to have partners who consistently used condoms. CONCLUSIONS: Harm reduction interventions must be designed to reach multiple Latino audiences by age, gender, and subgroup     

AIDS knowledge, attitudes and beliefs among Chinese college students: implications for PSA development

With growing numbers of reported HIV cases in The People's Republic of China, PRC health officials face the same information dissemination problems that have plagued other nations for a decade. The purpose of this study was to begin to understand Chinese college students' knowledge, attitudes and beliefs about HIV/AIDS as well as the cultural barriers which may prevent the acceptance of AIDS public service efforts. Focus group interviews were conducted with 76 college students at Xiamen University, PRC. Interviews revealed that many inaccurate beliefs exist regarding the AIDS disease and its modes of transmission. While many of the respondents reported that fate was the determining factor in trans mission of HIV, most felt distanced--physically, morally and culturally--from those at risk.     

农村居民艾滋病歧视态度和行为的影响因素分析

目的分析农村居民对艾滋病感染者歧视态度和行为的影响因素，为制定和完善消除艾滋病歧视的政策或策略提供依据。方法分别在襄樊市襄城区和南漳县随机抽取2个村，每个村采取入户调查的方式随机调查50名村民，共收回有效问卷196份。数据分析方法包括秩和检验和Logistic多元回归分析。结果被调查对象的艾滋病一般知识知晓率与其对艾滋病感染者的态度相关（r=0．2916，P〈0．01），但是与相关行为无关。艾滋病传播途径相关知识知晓与态度相关（r=0．4444，P〈0．01），与行为也相关（r=0．3525，P〈0．01）。对艾滋病感染者的态度与其相关行为呈现相关（r=0．6523，P〈0．01）。Logistic回归分析显示，传播途径知识知晓率、性别和婚姻状况是艾滋病歧视态度的影响因素，而影响歧视行为的因素为传播途径知识知晓率。结论艾滋病传播途径知识知晓率与艾滋病歧视态度和行为密切相关，在消除艾滋病歧视的策略制定上，要特别关注对艾滋病传播途径和非传播途径的宣传教育，从而减少艾滋病歧视现象。     

Educational intervention in pharmacy students' attitudes to HIV/AIDS and drug misuse

Summary: By providing injecting equipment to drug misusers, community pharmacists in the UK may become involved in preventing the spread of HIV via the intravenous route. Over 60% of pharmacy graduates from the School of Pharmacy enter community pharmacy and, as part of their undergraduate course, attend a series of lectures and seminars on HIV/AIDS and drug misuse. The aim of this research was to:

• (1) 

  investigate students' attitudes to these subjects;
• 2 

  assess the students' knowledge of HIV/AIDS;
• 3 

  evaluate any change in level of knowledge or of attitude after attending the course; and
• 4 

  investigate students' attitudes towards the teaching of these subjects.

A questionnaire was administered to students before and after their undergraduate course. The level of knowledge increased significantly after attending the course. Students were asked their opinion on the teaching of HIV/AIDS and drug misuse at the School of Pharmacy. After the course, significantly more responded 'good' or 'very good' with regard to teaching on social issues in drug misuse, rehabilitation and treatment of drug misusers, and health education on HIV/AIDS. There was no significant change in attitude, after the course. Attitude to HIV/AIDS and drug misuse was found to be unassociated with previous experience of working in pharmacies supplying injecting equipment and prescribed methadone. Both attitude and pre-course assessed knowledge were significantly associated with race and religion. These results indicate that attending the course had the effect of increasing knowledge of HIV/AIDS and increasing confidence in counselling clients. The perception of the teaching was also seen to be more positive.     

山西省某既往有偿献血地区村民艾滋病歧视及其影响因素的研究

了解山西省某既往有偿献血地区村民的艾滋病歧视现状及探索引起歧视的可能因素，为进一步开展减少艾滋病歧视活动提供针对性措施。 1．对象与方法：①根据当地卫生部门提供的既往有偿献血活动，选择12个献血情况较严重的村庄作为研究现场。从当地公安部门获得这12个村所有村民的名单及基本信息，以18～59岁村民作为抽样框架，按村庄人口比例随机抽取660名18～59岁的村民作为研究对象。样本量计算及研究对象招募情况参照文献。     

HIV/AIDS knowledge, attitudes, related behaviors, and sources of information among Korean adolescents

To examine HIV/AIDS knowledge, attitudes, related behaviors, and sources of HIV/AIDS information among high school-aged students in South Korea. One thousand and seventy-seven students (586 females and 491 males) from 5 high schools from 5 representative school districts participated in the survey. A self-administered questionnaire measuring knowledge (19 true-false items), attitudes (4 items, 5-point Likert-type scale), sources of information (6 items, yes/no), and sexual behaviors (8 items, yes/no) was utilized. The level of HIV/AIDS knowledge among Korean adolescents was moderate, with the mean scores of 13.93 out of 19 for males and 13.35 for females (p < .01). Attitudes toward persons with HIV/AIDS were negative, with the mean scores of 3.06 for males and 3.09 for females. Of 42 respondents (4.4%) who had engaged in sexual intercourse, 18 (40%) had used condoms. Almost half of the total respondents reported they were not concerned about HIV/AIDS (46.0%), and 94.4% indicated the need for receiving HIV prevention education in the future. The respondents identified TV (52.5%) and school classes (32.1%) as the two major sources of information on HIV/AIDS. Only a few pointed to their parents (1.3%) as a source of information. This preliminary study summarizes the current status of prevention education on HIV/AIDS available in Korea and can provide implications for developing more differentiated intervention strategies specific to culture, age, and gender.     

Quantitative process evaluation of a community-based HIV/AIDS behavioural intervention in rural Uganda

This paper describes the implementation of a large community-based HIV/AIDS behavioural intervention in rural Uganda and presents 4 years' worth of quantitative process data. The intervention involved 560 field-based workers (57% male, 76% subsistence farmers, mean age 35 years), supervised by six central staff. Intervention channels included drama and video shows, Community Educators (CEs), as well as leaflet and condom distribution. Activities focused on one or more of 16 key topics. In total, 392 000 attendances (51% female) were recorded--a mean of over 6 for each of the 64 000 target adults--at 81 000 activities, with CEs attracting 71% of the total attendance; 164 000 leaflets and 242 000 condoms were also distributed. The annual cost of the intervention per target individual was approximately US$1.76. Our voluntary workforce experienced an annual attrition rate of 11%, with 'stable' workers more likely to be older, married or opinion leaders in their community than those who dropped out. We calculate that even a significant increase in the proportion of female field workers would have made little difference either to the sex ratio of attendees or to overall attendance. In spite of some initial resistance to the intervention, particularly in relation to condoms, we have demonstrated that people in rural Africa can accept and actively participate in the dissemination of HIV/AIDS prevention messages throughout their own communities.     

我国育龄妇女艾滋病相关知识和态度调查

目的了解我国育龄妇女对艾滋病相关知识和态度。方法2010年10月,在我国30个县采用分层、三阶段与规模成正比的容量比例抽样方法获得调查对象,对7364名15—49岁的育龄妇女进行面对面的问卷调查。结果仅有41．1％的调查对象全面了解与艾滋病病毒（HIV）传播相关的10个问题,对接吻和蚊虫叮咬等6种非传播途径的回答正确率较低（44．7％）。66．4％的妇女了解艾滋病预防措施。近1／4的调查对象认为安全套可以在阴茎疲软后再取下,超过30％的调查对象认为使用安全套前应吹气检查是否漏气或可以使用油质润滑剂。不支持HIV感染者享有生育权利者约占1／3（33．6％）,认为应该将HIV感染者隔离起来者约占1／4（25．2％）。结论育龄妇女对于HIV非传播途径以及安全套的使用上还存在错误的认识,对于HIV感染者的歧视仍然比较常见。