Study on Social Capital in Female Students of Arak University of Medical Sciences, Central Iran

Abstract

Introduction: Social capital refers to the norms and social organization that makes people to cooperate for gaining reciprocal advantages. Focusing of its importance on health, the aim of this study was to evaluate social capital in the female students of Arak University of Medical Sciences, central Iran. Method: A cross-sectional study was done on 359 female students of Arak University of Medical Sciences in the fields of medicine, public health, nursing, laboratory sciences, anesthesia and operation room using simple random sampling in 2018. Bullen Social capital questionnaire was used for data collection. Data analysis was performed using one-way ANOVA, t-test and Pearson's correlation coefficient. Results The results showed that among all the social capital issues, the highest average (57.18±91.81) is professional communication and the lowest average (33.19±93.49) is participation in social activities. Also social capital showed a significant association with variables such as educational level (p=0.01), marital status (p=0.03), first (mother) language (p=0.01), and family size (p=0.03). Conclusion: Considering that social capital has a significant association with variables such educational and demographic, interventions by stakeholders may increase the social capital.