Chapter 11

Family Stress and Crisis: Violence among Intimates

• Violence Policy Center’s annual report on domestic homicide. South Carolina: #1

• 61 women were killed by men.

• 56 were killed by someone they knew.• 33 were slain by husbands, ex-husbands, common-law

husbands and boyfriends, the report said.

• 4 were killed by strangers.

• The report also found:• 17 were killed with guns• 12 were killed with knives• 7 were killed by bodily force

• 3 were killed with a blunt object

The Nature of Stress and Crisis

• Crisis: A critical change of events that disrupts the functioning of a person’s life

• Family Stress: Tensions that test a family’s emotional resources

• Acute Stress: Short-term stress

• Chronic Stress: Long-term stress

The Ten Most Common Family Stressors

Responses to Stress• General Adaptation Syndrome: Predictable

pattern body follows when coping with stress, includes:

• Alarm reaction– Brain perceives stressor & sends a message– Fight or Flight

• Resistance• Maintains elevated state of alert

• Exhaustion• Depression, fatigue, frequent headaches, panic

attacks, insomnia, and eating disorders

Social Readjustment Rating Scale

A scale of major life events over the past year

Each is assigned a point value

The Nature of Stress and Crisis

Patterns of Family Crises(3 phases)

1. Event that causes the crisis

2. Period of disorganization that follows

3. Reorganization that takes place afterwards

Five Patterns: Effects of Stress/Crises on Family Functioning

The Nature of Stress and Crisis

• Coping or Not: The ABC-X Models

• ABC-X Model: Model to help understand variation in ways that families cope with stress and crisis

• Double ABC-X Model: Model to help understand effects of the accumulation of stresses and crises–And how families adapt to them

ABC-X Model of Family Stress and Crisis

Double ABC-X Model of Family Crisis: Pile-Up

Violence among Intimates

• Violence is a social problem because:

• It affects large numbers of people

• Violence is not completely random

Intimate Partner Violence• Violence between those who are physically

and sexually intimate, such as spouses or partners

• Physical

• Economic

• Sexual

• Psychological abuse

Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS)

• Based on how people deal with disagreements in relationships

National Domestic Violence Hotline (2013)

•More than 1 in 3 women (35.6%)

•More than 1 in 4 men (28.5%)

•Have experienced:

•Rape

•Physical violence, and/or

•Stalking by an intimate partner in their lifetime.

Approximately 1 in 4 women (24.3%)1 in 7 men (13.8%)

Experienced severe physical violence by an intimate partner

Men face the threat and the reality of domestic violence

Challenges to overcoming abuse and maltreatment.

Intimate Partner Violence by Gender

Women Raped or Physically Assaulted in Lifetime by Race/Ethnicity

Lifetime Reports of Stalking Among Female Victims by Type of Tactic Experienced (2010)

Physical and Mental Health Outcomes among Those Who Have Been Victims of Rape,

Stalking, or Intimate Partner Violence, 2010

Intimate Partner Violence

• Coping with Violence

• Learned Helplessness: – Psychological condition of feeling:– Helpless– Having no control

• Caused by repeated abuse

Battered Women’s Syndrome

•Subcategory of post-traumatic stress syndrome

•Used to describe someone who has been the victim of consistent and/or severe domestic violence

•Four Stages:

1. Denial: The first stage occurs when a victim of abuse is unable to admit and acknowledge that they are being subjected to domestic violence.

2. Guilt: Feelings of extreme guilt and disgrace. Believe they have caused the abuse

Battered Women’s Syndrome

3. Enlightenment: Victim recognizes that they are not to blame for the abuse that they are experiencing

•Understand that no one deserves to be subjected to domestic violence

Battered Women’s Syndrome

4. Responsibility: Once a victim recognizes domestic violence they are suffering is fault of their abuser

•Only a matter of time before victims understand importance of escaping their environment.

•Essential to plan their escape

Lifetime Reports of Sexual Violence Among Female Victims by Type of Perpetrator, 2010

Child Abuse

• Forms: Neglect, physical abuse, sexual abuse, and emotional maltreatment

• People of all ages abuse children– Younger parents are more likely to do so

• Abuse leaves nearly 18,000 children permanently disabled every year.

Most Common Types of Child Abuse

Perpetrator’s Relationship to the Victim

Child Abuse and Neglect

• Sex Trafficking: An industry in which children are coerced, kidnapped, sold, or deceived into sexual encounters

• Trafficking is the most severe form of child abuse.

• As many as 1.4 million children per year are enslaved and moved across international borders as sex slaves.

Elder Abuse

• Can include:

• Physical abuse

• Sexual abuse

• Psychological abuse

• Financial or material exploitation

• Neglect

Explanations for Violence among Intimates

• Micro-Level Explanations

• Intergenerational Transmission of Violence: A cycle of violence that is passed down to dependents

• Stress:

• Unemployment, poor health, or financial difficulties.

Explanations for Violence among Intimates

• Macro-Level Explanations

• Patriarchy

• Cultural Norms Support Violence

• Norms of Family Privacy

• A Synthesis: Power and Control• Men who assault partners are exerting their

domination, power, and control over women.

Power and Control Wheel

The Public’s Response

• Violence and the Law

• Domestic Violence Shelters

• Defined as a temporary safe house for a woman (with or without children)

• Escaping an abusive relationship

Treatment Programs for Abusers

• Challenge of teaching anger management is that many abusers are actually quite good at managing their anger

• They know not to explode in public

• Not to leave bruises

• Know what to say afterwards so that their partner will not leave them