The relationship between fear of violence and self-efficiency: A study on healthcare professionals

Violence and fear of violence are among the most important problems of health care organizations. This situation, which leads to serious reactions such as health workers' quitting their work, continues to be a major issue despite many regulations made by the authorities. Professional and personal competencies of health workers are one of the most important factors in combating violence. The fact that individuals with high self-efficacy have high problem solving and success indicators is seen as a significant factor in solving the problems they encounter in the provision of health services. In this framework, this study aims to examine the relationship between the fear of violence and self-efficacy of health workers. The population of the study consists of 235 healthcare professionals (physicians-nurses) working in the emergency department and anesthesia intensive care unit of Sakarya Training and Research Hospital and have a higher risk of experiencing violence. The sample of the study consists of 158 (67.23%) health workers reached by convenience sampling method. Questionnaire method was used as data collection tool in the study. The questionnaire form consists of the socio-demographic characteristics of the participants, the Exposure to Violence scale developed by Rogers (1994) and the Self-Efficacy Scale developed by Schwarzer and Jerusalem (1995). Descriptive statistical methods, correlation analysis, regression analysis, Mann-Whitney U test and Kruskal Wallis-H test were used in the analysis of the data. The data were analyzed at 95% confidence level (p=0.05). According to the findings of the study, there is a negative correlation between fear of violence and self-efficacy. The study finds that the fear of violence has a major effect on self-efficacy. There is no difference in the fear of violence and self-efficacy levels of the participants in terms of gender, marital status, age, work experience and educational status. On the other hand, there is a significant difference in the fear of being exposed to violence according to the titles of the participants and their previous exposure to violence at work. According to the prominent results of the study, most of the participants experience the fear of being exposed to violence. There is a negative correlation between fear of violence and self-efficacy. According to this result, the violence experienced by health workers in health institutions and the fear of violence that develops accordingly affects the self-efficacy of health workers negatively. For this reason, it is important to prepare safe work environments that will eliminate the fear of violence and violence and to develop work conditions that will reduce the risk of violence towards health workers whose services contribute to human life.