Risk Factors for Multiple Violations of Protective Orders in Intimate Partner Violence Against Women.

This study examined 1,134 cases of violence against women in intimate partner relationships with violations of protective orders in a monitoring period of up to 15 months. The dynamics of time and violence were analyzed in the cases of multiple violation versus one-time violation, with the objective of identifying and thus neutralizing the risk factors for this type of recidivism. The results showed that early violation, serious physical violence, death threats, as well as jealousy, harassment, and control are related to multiple violation. This article discusses the results in comparison with other research and proposes measures to avoid revictimizations.

Discursos sobre violencia contra la mujer de jóvenes y profesionales en España. Proyecto PositivMasc / Discourses on violence against women by young people and professionals in Spain: PositivMasc project

Objetivo: Analizar los discursos de jóvenes y profesionales sobre la violencia contra la mujer y explorar las posibles estrategias para su prevención en España.Método: Estudio cualitativo basado en entrevistas semiestructuradas a 16 jóvenes (18-24 años) y 23 profesionales que trabajan en la prevención de la violencia contra la mujer. Se llevó a cabo un análisis del discurso para identificar los principales repertorios interpretativos.Resultados: Los cuatro repertorios interpretativos de este estudio reflejan cómo las personas jóvenes perciben la violencia física en el ámbito doméstico como el tipo de violencia contra la mujer más visible. En sus discursos, tanto hombres como mujeres jóvenes describen el carácter bidireccional de la violencia en el ámbito de la pareja. Emerge la alusión a la responsabilidad de los agentes sociales en la perpetuación de la violencia contra la mujer. Por último, las personas jóvenes y profesionales destacan el papel clave de los chicos en la prevención de la violencia contra la mujer.Conclusiones: La violencia física continúa siendo el principal tipo de violencia percibido por la población joven, pero mayoritariamente las chicas fueron capaces de identificar otras formas de violencia más sutiles y normalizadas. Los agentes sociales tienen una fuerte influencia en el imaginario sobre la violencia contra la mujer de la población joven. Por último, las futuras estrategias contra la violencia contra la mujer deben contar con la participación de los hombres jóvenes desde estrategias comunitarias que trabajen en la promoción de actitudes y relaciones positivas e igualitarias.(AU)

Objective: To analyze the discourses of young people and professionals on violence against women and to explore possible strategies for its prevention in Spain.Method: Qualitative study based on semi-structured interviews with 16 young people (18–24 years old) and 23 professionals working in violence against women prevention. A discourse analysis was carried out to identify the main interpretative repertoires.Results: The four interpretative repertoires of this study reflect how young people perceive physical violence in the domestic sphere as the most visible type of violence against women. In their discourses, both young men and women describe the bidirectional nature of intimate partner violence. The allusion to the responsibility of social agents in the perpetuation of violence against women emerges. Finally, young people and professionals emphasize the key role of boys in the prevention of violence against women.Conclusions: Physical violence continues to be the main type of violence perceived by the young population, but most girls were able to identify other more subtle and normalized forms of violence. Social agents have a strong influence on the imaginary of violence against women in the young population. Finally, future strategies against violence against women must involve young men in community-based strategies that work to promote positive and egalitarian attitudes and relationships.(AU)

Reduction in prevalence of spousal physical violence against women in India: evidence from three national surveys.

Spousal physical violence (PV) against women is considered to be major health issue in developing countries. Lifetime physical violence is a composite outcome consists of hit, kick, beat, slap and threatened with weapon, perpetrated by the husband. The study aims to examine changes in prevalence and specific risk factors for PV from 1998 to 2016 in India. This study analyzed data from a cross sectional epidemiological survey in 1998-1999, NFHS-3 (2005-2006) and NFHS-4 (2015-2016) data. There was a significant decline of about 10% (95% CI: 8.8%-11.1%) in PV. Major risk factors for change in PV were husband's use of alcohol, illiteracy and socio-economic status of the household. The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act may have played a role in reducing the PV. Even though there was a decline in PV, actions have to be implemented from the root level to ensure women empowerment.

The role of effective factors on suicidal tendency of women in Turkey.

Background/Aim: This study aims to identify the variables that influence the suicidal tendency of women who are married, have had a relationship or are currently in a relationship in Turkey. Methods: This study uses cross-sectional data from the 2014 Hacettepe University Institute of Population Studies National Research on Domestic Violence Against Women in Turkey. Data from 6,458 women between the ages of 15 and 49 were analyzed in this dataset. Binary logistic regression was used to determine the factors influencing women's suicidal tendencies. Results: Based on the analysis's findings, age, education level, health status, number of children, the sector in which the spouse/partner works, the drinking status of the spouse/partner, the situation where the spouse/partner fights with another man in a way that involves physical violence, the cheating status of the spouse/partner, the controlling behaviour of the spouse/partner, exposure to various types of violence by both the spouse/partner and someone other than the partner, and the household income level variables were found to be associated with the suicidal tendency of women. Conclusion: Prioritizing women who are, in particular, between the ages of 15 and 24, live in the south of Turkey, have a high school education, are in poor health, are childless, have low household incomes, live with an unemployed spouse or partner, and are exposed to various forms of violence from their partner or other sources can be achieved more effective results in reducing and preventing women's suicidal behaviors.

Innovative Strategies to Facilitate Safe Assessment and Intervention for Intimate Partner Violence During a Pandemic and Beyond.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made it necessary to find innovative strategies that facilitate safe, private assessment and intervention for intimate partner violence (IPV). IPV is a major source of morbidity and mortality, with women experiencing a lifetime prevalence rate of 22%. Screening pregnant individuals for IPV during the COVID-19 pandemic became critical because a 20% rise in IPV during the pandemic has been estimated. A multidisciplinary stakeholder panel created a process using technology to address this concern. An infographic poster with IPV screening questions and a Quick Response (QR) code was displayed in bathrooms in the perinatal service area. The infographic allowed respondents to signal a safety concern, launching an individualized plan of care to address their needs privately. The pandemic has highlighted how much work needs to be done to ensure that people who experience IPV continue to obtain access to support and health care.

Intimate partner violence and female property rights.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) affects 30% of ever-partnered women worldwide. This study demonstrates how stronger female marital property rights can lead to lower levels of IPV. If women are financially protected outside of marriage, they in turn experience lower levels of violence inside marriage. Using a natural experiment from the colonization of Sub-Saharan Africa, this study aims to isolate the direct effect of large-scale changes to women's property rights from other IPV risk factors. The findings show that more equitable marital property rights could both reduce the incidence of IPV and also increase women's own condemnation of the violence. The empirical estimates suggest that legal property reform could render at least 12 million women less vulnerable to IPV across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Economic violence against women: A case in Turkey.

The aim of this study was to determine the factors affecting the exposure of women in the 15-59 age group in Turkey to economic violence by their husbands/partners. The micro data set of the National Research on Domestic Violence against Women in Turkey, which was conducted by the Hacettepe University Institute of Population Studies, was employed in this study. The factors affecting women's exposure to economic violence were determined using the binary logistic regression analysis. In the study, women in the 15-24, 25-34 and 35-44 age group had a higher ratio of exposure to economic violence compared to the reference group. Women who graduated from elementary school, secondary school, and high school had a higher ratio of exposure to economic violence compared to those who have never gone to school. Women's exposure to physical, sexual and verbal violence was also important factor affecting women's exposure to economic violence. The results obtained in this study are important in that they can be a source of information for establishing policies and programs to prevent violence against women. This study can also be a significant guide in determining priority areas for the resolution of economic violence against women.

The 1994 Violence Against Women Act: A Historic Response to Gender Violence.

The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is frequently questioned about its success, especially during times of its reauthorization. While federal, state, local, and private organizations have funded a significant amount of research through VAWA since its inception, questions remain as to whether the field has the evidence to make a concrete judgment about its success. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, we review the Act and its subsequent reauthorizations. Second, the article addresses issues related to VAWA's success. We consider whether it is possible to answer Moore Parmley's question posed in 2004, p. 1,428: " . . . on the anniversary of the VAWA, will we be able to say with any confidence that the Act helped to prevent violence against women?"

Domestic violence in the coronavirus disease 2019 era: Insights from a survivor.

Amid the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, there has been an alarming rise in domestic violence worldwide. Factors believed to be fueling this escalation in domestic violence include increasing social confinement at home during lockdowns and mounting stress levels from unemployment that have resulted from the economic uncertainties of these times. This contribution explores some of the challenges faced by physicians in clinically assessing victims of domestic violence during the COVID-19 era. One such challenge is the increased reliance on telemedicine during the pandemic, a medium of communication that offers a narrower clinical view of patients than is what is usually provided by an in-person examination. In this contribution, we offer suggestions on how best to screen for domestic violence, whether through telemedicine or during an in-person encounter. The history and physical findings that suggest domestic violence are reviewed along with recommendations on how to make the clinical examination more sensitive and compassionate to the needs of the victims. One of the authors of this contribution (L.C.H.) is herself a survivor of domestic violence and has courageously shared, in these pages, details of her harrowing near murder by an abusing husband. From this case history, it is hoped that readers will gain wider insights into what domestic violence means from the perspective of a victim and how we can better help save victims from this widespread and devastating social problem.

The Experiences of Domestic Violence Shelter Workers and Their Perceptions of Shelter Services: A Preliminary Study.

With domestic violence shelters faced with the persistent and arduous challenge of intimate partner violence, using an online survey, we explored the experiences of 98 shelter workers, including their perceptions of shelter services. Findings revealed that a majority of respondents (94%) indicated that through their work, they have had a positive influence on shelter residents. Moreover, 68% agreed that shelters are successful with providing services that will aid women in becoming self-sufficient, and 94% would like to see shelters have a greater impact on helping women find the pathway to economic independence. Thirty-six and 39% of participants, respectively, endorsed items about compassion fatigue and secondary trauma, and slightly more than half (51%) were frustrated by their work. Challenges in the provision of services included lack of funding, housing, and mental health and communal living issues. Incorporation of wellness efforts and self-care practices are encouraged in order for shelter workers to reduce susceptibility to compassion fatigue and secondary trauma.

Community stakeholders' views on reducing violence against women in Pakistan.

BACKGROUND: Nearly half of the women experience violence across their lifespan in all the provinces of Pakistan at an alarming rate. Despite knowing the prevalence, there has been meager progress in developing strategies to combat violence at individual, family, or community level. Many interventions suggested in other countries have been pilot tested but the effects of those interventions had been limited. Therefore, the aim of this study is to understand the voices of stakeholders to reduce Violence Against Women (VAW) and to explore the possible community-based strategies that could be implemented in Pakistan. METHODS: A total of 14 Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) and 18 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were held across all four provinces of Pakistan. Participants were purposefully recruited and all the interviews were audio-recorded. Transcriptions were open coded and content analysis was done to emerge codes, categories and themes. Ethical approval was obtained from Aga Khan University Ethics Review Committee. RESULTS: Three major themes emerged on community members and stakeholders' views on VAW: a) community's perception of VAW b) the repercussions of VAW, and c) multiple voices regarding strategies to reduce VAW. Participants voiced the need of standing against the status quo, role of awareness and education: regarding capacity building skills, promotion of women rights and women empowerment through Life Skills Based Education (LSBE) through national health works program, has been proposed as an innovative strategy to reduce VAW. CONCLUSIONS: The responsibility to bring about a substantial change in behavior and attitudes must begin with engaging men in all the interventions that aim to reduce violence. Since, VAW is very much linked with the cultural norms, so, without community stakeholder's involvement and participation it could never be reduced. Keeping the existing socio-cultural dynamics in mind, the need of time is to design and implement innovative interventions that are culturally and contextually appropriate and can be expanded across the country.

'The public health turn on violence against women': analysing Swedish healthcare law, public health and gender-equality policies.

This article focuses on policy and law concerning violence against women as a public health issue. In Sweden, violence against women is recently recognized as a public health problem; we label this shift "The public health turn on violence against women". The new framing implies increased demands on the Swedish healthcare sector and its' ability to recognise violence and deal with it in terms of prevention and interventions. The aim was to describe and discuss the main content and characteristics of Swedish healthcare law, and national public health and gender-equality policies representing the public health turn on violence against women. Through discursive policy analysis, we investigate how the violence is described, what is regarded to be the problem and what solutions and interventions that are suggested in order to solve the problem. Healthcare law articulates violence against women as an ordinary healthcare issue and the problem as shortcomings to provide good healthcare for victims, but without specifying what the problem or the legal obligation for the sector is. The public health problem is rather loosely defined, and suggested interventions are scarce and somewhat vague. The main recommendations for healthcare are to routinely ask patients about violence exposure. Violence against women is usually labelled "violence within close relationships" in the policies, and it is not necessarily described as a gender equality problem. While violence against women in some policy documents is clearly framed as a public health problem, such a framing is absent in others, or is transformed into a gender-neutral problem of violence within close relationships. It is not clearly articulated what the framing should lead to in terms of the healthcare sector's obligations, interventions and health promotions, apart from an ambivalent discourse on daring to ask about violence.

Community activism as a strategy to reduce intimate partner violence (IPV) in rural Rwanda: Results of a community randomised trial.

BACKGROUND: There is considerable interest in community organising and activism as a strategy to shift patriarchal gender norms, attitudes and beliefs and thus reduce intimate partner violence (IPV). Yet there is limited insight into how activism actually translates into reduced violence, including how aspects of programme implementation or cultural context may affect impact. This study evaluates the community activism/mobilisation portion of Indashyikirwa, a multi-component, IPV prevention programme implemented in rural Rwanda. The activism part of Indashyikirwa was based on SASA!, a promising program model from Uganda with demonstrated effectiveness. METHODS: We implemented two separate cross-sectional surveys as part of a larger community randomised controlled trial to assess the impact of the community portion of Indashyikirwa on preventing physical and/or sexual IPV and other secondary outcomes at a community level. The survey consisted of a random household-based sample of 1400 women and 1400 men at both waves. Surveys were conducted before community-level activities commenced and were repeated 24 months later with a new cross-sectional sample. Longitudinal, qualitative data were collected as part of an embedded process evaluation. RESULTS: There was no evidence of an intervention effect at a community level on any of the trial's primary or secondary outcomes, most notably women's experience of physical and/or sexual IPV from a current male partner in the past 12 months (adjusted odds ratio (aOR) = 1.25; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.92-1.70, P = 0.16), or men's perpetration of male-to-female physical and/or sexual IPV (aOR = 1.02; 95% CI = 0.72-1.45, P = 0.89). Process evaluation data suggest that delays due to challenges in adapting and implementing SASA!-style activites in rural Rwanda may account for the trial's failure to measure an effect. Additionally, the intervention strategy of informal activism was not well suited to the Rwandan context and required considerable modification. CONCLUSIONS: Failure to reduce violence when implementing an adaptation of SASA! in rural Rwanda highlights the importance of allowing sufficient time for adapting evidence-based programming (EBP) to ensure cultural appropriateness and fidelity. This evaluation held little chance of demonstrating impact since the project timeline forced endline evaluation only months after certain elements of the programme became operational. Donors must anticipate longer time horizons (5 to 7 years) when contemplating evaluations of novel or newly-adapted programmess for reducing IPV at a population level. These findings also reinforce the value of including embedded process evaluations when investing in rigorous trials of complex phenomena such as community activism. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT03477877.

Developing and testing a readiness tool for interpersonal violence prevention partnerships with community-based projects.

Community-based projects that serve vulnerable families have the opportunity to identify and respond to interpersonal violence (IPV). We developed a readiness assessment tool to support selection of projects to participate in an initiative that involved implementing a community-based IPV intervention for mothers. The overarching aim of the current study was to describe the development of this tool and examine the reliability of coding, validity, and utility of the tool. After developing and refining the tool, 41 community-based projects completed the tool. Responses were coded and scored; scores were used to select projects for the initiative. Preliminary validation for the tool included (a) expert opinion, (b) uptake/implementation of the intervention, and (c) feedback and responses from service providers in terms of the usefulness and importance of the tool. This tool can be used by both researchers and service providers to assess community project readiness and capacity to provide trauma-informed services for vulnerable families.

Gender Norms and Beliefs, and Men's Violence Against Women in Rural Bangladesh.

Prevention of violence against women requires understanding men's controlling attitudes and behaviors toward women. In Bangladesh, while the incidence of men's violence against women is alarmingly increasing, existing research to understand the determinants of men's violent behavior resulted in contradictory findings. The current study explores rural Bangladeshi men's support for gender norms, beliefs, and attitudes concerning violence against women, and looks at how these are influenced by men's age, marital status, education, and affiliation with organizations that promote gender equality. The study also attempts to understand men's bystander attitudes and responses to incidents of violence against women. Using the theoretical framework of hegemonic masculinity, the study was conducted among a sample of 1,200 men and women. Results indicate that in the study areas, young, unmarried men are less supportive to gender norms, beliefs, and attitudes that promote violence against women. Positive association was observed with men's educational attainment and affiliation with nongovernmental organization (NGO) interventions. Regardless of age, marital status, or education, men's bystander response toward intervening to prevent violence against women was found to be low. Women showed similar level of support for inequitable gender norms, beliefs, and attitudes. Analysis of the findings using a hegemonic masculinity lens reveals more complicated dynamics of power and hegemonic control at work that perpetuate men's violence against women. Based on the findings, the study also identifies possible strategies for violence prevention interventions in Bangladesh.

Mental and Active Preparation: Examining Variations in Women's Processes of Preparing to Leave Abusive Relationships.

Although the process of leaving abusive relationships has received increased research attention, preparing to leave is still largely understudied. Despite an emphasis on safety planning, not all women take active steps to prepare, and the characteristics and experiences of those who do or do not actively prepare are unknown. We address this gap with a secondary data analysis of interviews with 25 abused mothers in the process of leaving. All women initially engaged in mental planning, where they had emotionally disconnected from their partners. Using constructivist grounded theory techniques, we identified two distinct groups: those whose mental planning led to active planning (n = 11), and those who moved directly from mental planning to leaving (n = 14) with little time or need to actively plan. The groups differed on several individual, relationship, and child factors, which may have impacted the ability or decisions to prepare. This study supports the feminist view that survivors are not helpless victims but active agents who strategize for safety. Those who engage solely in mental planning still prepare to leave, even if they do not engage in active planning. Practitioners should consider factors affecting preparations and acknowledge mental planning as a necessary effort in leaving.

A phenomenological study of the experience of domestic violence in Iranian women with HIV.

This study explores the lived experience of domestic violence in HIV-infected women in Iran using a qualitative phenomenological approach. Data were collected in 2014 through in-depth interview of twelve HIV-infected women purposefully selected from a counselling centre in Tehran. The qualitative data were analysed using a thematic analysis approach. The main theme that emerged was 'the sunset of life' - an emotional numbing and fragile marital relationship resulting from the violence suffered by the women. From this, three sub-themes expressing women's feelings of hopelessness were extracted: 'the destroyed life', 'being in the destiny prison' and 'living on the edge of annihilation'. The results revealed that although the experience of domestic violence had devastating effects on women's lives, HIV infection was the factor that forced them to remain trapped in violent relationships. The findings emphasize the importance of designing comprehensive violence prevention strategies tailored to meeting the needs of HIV-infected women in Iran.