School children's stigmatising attitude towards peers with epilepsy in Nigeria

Abstract

Very few studies have examined stigmatising attitudes towards epilepsy by school children in Africa. We explored attitude towards epilepsy among 205 secondary school students in Lagos, Nigeria. Stigmatising attitude was measured by a modified Bogardus Social Distance Scale. A significant proportion of the students endorsed negative attitudes towards peers with epilepsy. For example, only 24% thought most students would invite an affected person to their birthday party and only 31% thought most students would like to study together with a person with epilepsy. Whereas 40% believed that epilepsy is caused by evil spirits, 24% believed it is infectious. Also, 37% believe their families consider epilepsy shameful, and 29% believe their families would not approve of friendship with a peer with epilepsy. Regression analysis identified significant predictors of increased stigmatising attitude as follows: perceived negative family attitude, limited familiarity with epilepsy and belief that epilepsy is caused by evil spirits. Our finding that the children's perception of their family's negative attitude predicted their own stigmatising attitude towards epilepsy is unique. It suggests that interventions to reduce negative attitudes towards epilepsy by school children in this region may be more effective if the strategies include their families. Such intervention should include provision of accurate information on epilepsy.

Keywords:

• epilepsy
• stigma
• students
• family attitude

Acknowledgements

We thank the students for participating in the study. We are grateful to their parents for giving consent. We also thank the headmasters of the four schools for their permission to conduct the study in their schools.