Abstract:

Child marriage or early marriage, commonly encountered in underdeveloped or developing countries, is an important woman and child public health problem. Since early marriages usually take place through religious practices without formal documentation, it is challenging to estimate the exact numbers. According to the statistics, approximately one in four women in Turkey is married before the age of eighteen. Early marriage is one of the most common forms of child abuse and it is a risk factor not only for physical and psychological disorders, but also for domestic violence. Although there have been some studies about early marriage in psychology recently, majority of them employed quantitative methods. The current study focused on understanding the experience of early marriage. For this purpose, semi-structured interviews were conducted with six early married women between the ages of 30 and 41. The analysis of the interviews was carried out by the Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). IPA was preferred because it attaches importance to the understanding of participants’ subjective experiences and also considers the cultural context in which the phenomenon was experienced and expressed. As a result of the analyses, four themes were obtained: “Negative experiences with the spouse,” “Experiences with in-laws,” “'Challenges and inabilities associated with the new role” and “Marital knowledge.” Obtained themes were discussed in the light of the relevant literature.

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