Witnessing Domestic Violence: A Case Study of Effects on the Child in the Short Film “Samskara”

Abstract

Domestic violence is an ongoing experience of physical, psychological, or sexual abuse in the home that is used to establish power and control over another person. Most of the medical literature has focused on the effects of domestic violence on the primary victims. What effect does witnessing domestic violence have on secondary victims, such as children who live in homes where the partners abuse others? This paper will examine how domestic violence leads children to develop age-dependent adverse effects. It will focus on the cognitive, behavioural, and emotional impact of domestic violence. It will analyse through the lens of affect theory how the abused child Abhimanyu adopts the personality and traits of his abusive father in his adolescence, which turns him into the same culprit for his wife.