The relationship between the attitudes of married women in the age range of 15?49 toward family planning methods and the contraceptive methods they use.

The research was conducted as a cross-sectional descriptive study to examine the relationship between the attitudes of married women in the age range of 15?49 toward family planning methods and the contraceptive methods they use. The study group consisted of 427 women who resided in the areas around the public health centers in the central province of Aydın between 09.06.2008 and 15.09.2008The study data were collected by a questionnaire that interrogates the profile data about the women and the independent variables of the study, as well as by the Family Planning Attitude Scale. Descriptive statistics, variance analysis, t-test, correlation, Cronbach Alpha and multiple regression analyses were employed to evaluate the dataThe mean age of the participant women was 33.52±7.82. The study found that most of the women were primary school graduates (36.5%) and 93.2% benefited from social security. It was also found that 60.4% of the women used modern contraceptive methods, while 26.0% used traditional contraceptive methods when the study was carried out. The women mostly preferred IUD (21.3%), birth control pills (16.2%), and condoms (14.1%) among the modern methods, while withdrawal (22.5%) was most commonly used as a traditional methodThe results of the multiple regression analysis demonstrated that there was a negative correlation between the scores on the Family Planning Attitude Scale and the use of traditional methods (p<0.05). When other possible contributing factors were also included in the model, a positive correlation was detected between factors such as being a university graduate, speaking on the issues about family planning with one?s husband, age and income level perceived as high and the attitude toward family planning, while a negative relationship was found between being a primary school graduate and the longest residence in a villageThis study revealed that a negative relationship exists between positive attitudes of women toward family planning and the use of traditional methods. These results suggest that the use of modern contraceptive methods can be improved by taking into account in the presentation of family planning services the factors of age, place of residence, socioeconomic structure, and husbands? participation, in addition to the use of traditional methods by women.Keywords: Attitude, family planning methods, family planning services.