STUDENTS’ PERCEPTION OF MYSTICAL AND PATHOGENIC AGENTS OF DISEASE CAUSATION

Back to Page Authors: Emmanuel C. Anizoba, Innocent Ebere Okereke

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Keywords: disease, mystical agents, pathogenic agents, biology

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Abstract: There are varied factors that can cause diseases hence, diseases are multifactorial in nature. Principally, diseases are caused by pathogens and parasites. Some environmental agents and/or factors that are culturally-based; capable of making an individual susceptible to diseases are called mystical agents. The study investigated students’ perception of mystical and pathogenic agents of disease causation. It was carried out in Obollo-Afor Education Zone of Enugu State of Nigeria. Guided by four research questions and two null hypotheses, the study employed a descriptive survey research design. The sample of 370 SS2 Biology students was drawn from the population of 4,828 SS2 Biology students using proportionate stratified random sampling technique. The instrument for data collection was a questionnaire in Likert format. It was face validated and has a reliability coefficient of 0.84 determined using Cronbach Alpha. Mean and the standard deviation was used to answer the research questions while t-test analysis was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Results show that students were aware that pathogenic agents such as virus, bacteria, pathogenic fungi, protozoa, and some worms cause diseases to man. They had the awareness that some diseases are associated with mystical agents such as fear, oath-breaking, ancestral causes, witches, sorcerers and ogbanje/repeater spirit. Also, students’ school location had no significant influence on their mean perception scores of the mystical and pathogenic agents of disease causation. Recommendations and conclusion were made.

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