DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Domestic Violence

Domestic Violence: Children and Spouse

Introduction

Violence against women is perpetuated through the interaction of numerous social variables: underlying attitudes that support male, aggression (e.g., patriarchy), gender role socialization (e.g., inequity of power between women and men), political structure, state-sponsored violence (e.g., civil and interstate wars), migration between and within countries (which increases women's vulnerability and lack of safety), and religious beliefs. Brought to prominence by women's movement initiatives, the plight of battered women in the United States gained attention in the 1970s (Schechter, 1982; Summers & Hoffman, 2002). Prior to that time, laws against wife abuse remained largely unenforced, and there were no available social services for millions of battered women (Summers & Hoffman). Two milestones, both occurring in 1974, are noteworthy: the opening of the first battered women's shelter in St. Paul, Minnesota, (Schechter) and the systematic research into domestic violence launched by Gelles' pioneering study on the incidence and likely origins of wife abuse (Hines & Malley-Morrison, 2005). Despite such recognition, domestic violence continues to be prevalent in the United States. As indicated by the alarming findings from the 1998 nationwide Commonwealth Fund survey of women's health (Collins et al., 1999), one out of three (31%) women reported having experienced abuse from an intimate partner in her lifetime, while 3 million women reported experiencing abuse from their intimate partners during the past year.

Domestic Violence:

Domestic violence refers to a pattern or cycle of assaultive, coercive, and abusive behaviors. It is “a process whereby one member of an intimate relationship experiences vulnerability, loss of power and control, and entrapment as a consequence of the other member's exercise of power through the patterned use of physical, sexual, psychological, and/or moral force” (DeVellis, 1998; as quoted in Barnett et al., 2005, p. 252).

The violence and abuse can be perpetrated in various forms and at varied frequency, intensity, and/or severity. An instance of conflict or disagreement may or may not precede a violent or abusive event, and the victimized partner may experience the event(s) as occurring “out of the blue,” as a predictable cycle of events, or as a constant presence in her life. This type of violence is “primarily unidirectional” (e.g., perpetrated by one partner on to the other), generally characterized by increased frequency and severity over the course of the intimate relationship, and has been found to be most common in shelter samples (Jouriles, McDonald, Norwood, & Ezell, 2001). The victim's or survivor's attempts to fend off her abuser or defend herself ought be confused with forms of domestic violence.

Domestic violence does not refer to occasional disagreements or conflict that are “ubiquitous” within an intimate relationship (Jouriles et al., 2001). Whereas intimate partner conflict may be considered constructive, as in joint problem solving for a mutually acceptable resolution, domestic or intimate partner violence does not involve any benefits to the victimized partner nor to children exposed to the violent events and/or its ramifications (Mills, 1998). Domestic violence refers to abusive and/or violent tactics initiated by the perpetrating partner ...