A randomized clinical trial of motivational enhancement therapy for alcohol problems in partner violent men.

This study examined the efficacy of brief alcohol intervention in the context of community-based treatment for partner violence. In a randomized clinical trial, 228 partner-violent men with hazardous or problem drinking were recruited at three Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) treatment agencies and randomly assigned to receive one of two 4-session alcohol interventions: Motivational Enhancement Therapy (MET: N = 110) or Alcohol Education (AE: N = 118). After completing alcohol intervention, participants received standard agency counseling services for IPV. Participants completed assessments of alcohol use, drug use, and IPV at pre-treatment, post-alcohol intervention, and quarterly follow-ups for 12 months. At the end of the 4-session alcohol intervention, MET participants displayed greater acknowledgment of problems with alcohol than AE participants (Partial ή2 = 0.039, p = 0.006). Significant changes from baseline across treatment conditions (at p < 0.001) were observed for percent days of alcohol abstinence [95% empirical CI for Partial ή2 =0.226, 0.296], heavy drinking [0.292, 0.349], illicit drug use [0.096, 0.156] and partner violence [0.282, 0.334]. No significant condition differences (treatment by time interactions) were found for alcohol abstinence [95% empirical CI for Partial ή2 = 0.007, 0.036], heavy drinking [0.016, 0.055], illicit drug use [0.005, 0.035] or partner violence [0.001, 0.004]. Results encourage continued use of brief alcohol interventions in community IPV services, but do not provide evidence of a unique benefit of MET in reducing alcohol use in this population.

Optimizing trauma-informed intervention for intimate partner violence in veterans: The role of alexithymia.

Recent research supports the efficacy of Strength at Home-Men's Program (SAH-M), a trauma-informed group intervention designed to reduce use of intimate partner violence (IPV) in veterans (Taft, Macdonald, Creech, Monson, & Murphy, 2016). However, change-processes facilitating the effectiveness of SAH-M have yet to be specified. Alexithymia, a deficit in the cognitive processing of emotional experience characterized by difficulty identifying and distinguishing between feelings, difficulty describing feelings, and use of an externally oriented thinking style, has been shown to predict PTSD severity and impulsive aggression; however, no studies have investigated the relationship between alexithymia and IPV. As such, the current study examined the role of improvements in alexithymia as a potential facilitator of treatment efficacy among 135 male veterans/service members, in a randomized control trial SAH-M. After an initial assessment including measures of IPV and alexithymia, participants were randomized to an Enhanced Treatment as Usual (ETAU) condition or SAH-M. Participants were assessed three and six months after baseline. Results demonstrated a statistically significant association between alexithymia and use of psychological IPV at baseline. Moreover, participants in the SAH-M condition self-reported significantly greater reductions in alexithymia over time relative to ETAU participants. Findings suggest that a trauma-informed intervention may optimize outcomes, helping men who use IPV both limit their use of violence and improve deficits in emotion processing.

PTSD symptoms predict outcome in trauma-informed treatment of intimate partner aggression.

OBJECTIVE: This study sought to extend findings from a randomized controlled trial of the Strength at Home Men's Program (SAH-M) for intimate partner aggression (IPA) in military veterans by examining the impact of pretreatment posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms on treatment efficacy, and by examining new data on postintervention follow-up for individuals who received SAH-M after completing the enhanced treatment as usual (ETAU) wait-list control condition. METHOD: Using data from 125 male veterans who attended the SAH-M program immediately after an intake assessment or after waiting 6-month in the ETAU condition, this study used generalized linear modeling to examine predictors of physical and psychological IPA over a 9-month period of time. RESULTS: PTSD symptoms at intake significantly predicted both physical and psychological IPA use, even after accounting for the effects of treatment condition, time, and number of sessions attended. PTSD had a strong association with both physical and psychological IPA. An interaction between PTSD and SAH-M was observed for psychological IPA but not physical IPA, and the magnitude of the effect was not clinically significant. There was a significant effect of SAH-M in reducing IPA in the full sample, including previously unanalyzed outcome data from the ETAU condition. CONCLUSION: The study results suggest that while SAH-M does not need to be modified to address the interaction between PTSD and treatment, outcomes could be enhanced through additional direct treatment of PTSD symptoms. Results extend prior analyses by demonstrating the effectiveness of SAH-M in reducing use of IPA in both the treatment and ETAU conditions. (PsycINFO Database Record