Applying the Social Ecological Model to Violence against Women with Disabilities

Alana Terry ,Mir M

doi:10.4172/2167-0420.1000193

Abstract

Violence against women (VAW) is a broad term used to capture aggressive acts committed toward women, which consists of numerous types of violence with the most commonly known types of abuse being emotional, sexual, and physical. One relatively invisible group, women with disabilities, not only experiences emotional, sexual, and physical abuse but also a unique type of disability-related abuse, which may increase their risk of experiencing acts of violence. The U.S. Congress passed two distinct yet not mutually exclusive policies into law to address violence against women and rights for individuals with disabilities: the Violence against Women Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. This paper will discuss these policies with suggestions to increase protection for women with disabilities experiencing violence and the implications for these policy changes using the social ecological model.

Highlights

Violence against women is a worldwide social phenomenon, considered an epidemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), affecting an estimated 33% of women [1]
The social ecological model levels consisted of the following levels: society (United States), policy (Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Violence against Women Act (VAWA)), community, interpersonal, and individual (Figure 1)
Strengthening the protections offered to women with disabilities under the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) policy will challenge the stereotypes at the society-level as well as require resources at the community-level to be available to women with disabilities who are in abusive interpersonal relationships and may be experiencing health consequences from being in an abusive relationship (Figure 2)

Summary

Introduction

Violence against women is a worldwide social phenomenon, considered an epidemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), affecting an estimated 33% of women [1]. Violence against women committed by current or former romantic partners is known in the literature as intimate partner violence, known as domestic violence [4]. A more appropriate term to describe the type of violence women with disabilities encounter is interpersonal violence, which encompasses the violence that occurs between family members and intimate partners and violence between acquaintances and strangers [6]. Women with disabilities are more vulnerable to abuse [7], with a 40% greater risk of violence than women without disabilities [8]. They remain an understudied subset of the population. As a relatively invisible group, women with disabilities, experience commonly known types of violence and disabilityrelated abuse [9]

Theoretical framework

Findings

The Russian doll metaphor offered by Bronfenbrenner illustrates