Abstract
This paper presents a qualitative study to understand the reasons for leaving or staying in an abusive relationship and how this informs planning for psychosocial interventions with victims. We present a study of 15 Portuguese women with children who were victims of intimate partner violence (IPV). The sample consisted of women, helped by a Victim Support Office, who volunteered to participate in a semi-structured interview and whose narrative responses were recorded and transcribed for analysis. The results, organized into two broad categories, reveal that the reasons for staying in the abusive relationship are essentially related to extrinsic factors (e.g., children, the aggressor, society), which reinforces myths (e.g., marriage is for life) and makes it difficult to break the cycle of violence. However, the decision to leave the abusive relationship is also based on the same factors which, when reconceptualized and empowered, contribute to the intrinsic recognition of the problem and the decision-making process. We find that the resilience portfolio model, which focuses on three major factors (self-regulation, interpersonal forces, and construction of meaning), favors the identification of protective factors that can guide interventions for individuals facing situations of adversity such as IPV.
Highlights
Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is one of the most frequent types of domestic violence
Shame appears as one of the reasons that these mothers/victims present for having remained in the abusive marital relationship. They say that revealing to their family or society that they were victims of violence was something that embarrassed them; they chose not to report, or request help in ending, the violent relationship, eventually accepting the consequences of it—“But at the time it was a shame to be a single mother, so I had to get married” (P1); “I didn’t go to the hospital and I should have gone because my nose was uneven and I didn’t go because it meant showing my face, so my parents would find out” (P4)
We found that extrinsic factors reveal the existence of myths that can make it difficult to interrupt the cycle of violence, and it is important that they are considered in an integrated intervention when supporting the victim
Summary
Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is one of the most frequent types of domestic violence. Research on IPV has developed a recognition of the factors and processes that contribute to the key decision by victims of abusive relationships of whether to stay or leave their partner (Anderson and Saunders 2003; Barrios et al 2020). This issue is important in models and intervention strategies aimed at the recovery of the victim of violence (Peterson 2020) and contributes to the general health and well-being of individuals after experiencing violence (Hamby et al 2017).
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