Discussions of Current Research on Intimate Partner Violence in Immigrant Communities

Accessibility:
General language. (Journal and article are directed toward a broad, educated readership.)

Focus:
Article examines general features of IPV, rather than those specific to individual ethnic group. Authors consider features of the immigrant experience that serve to foster intimate partner violence.

Key points:

1. Abuser uses victims’ unfamiliarity with language, culture, and social customs as means to isolate and control.
2. Extended families support and protect batterer, or participate in abuse.
3. "Old World" attitudes towards gender roles entitle men to abuse women.
4. Victim depends upon abuser for visa status, fears deportation if ending relationship.
5. Some culture-specific methods of abuse may not be recognized by service providers from the community-at-large.
6. Barriers to seeking police protection:
   • lack of information
   • no social support
   • poor English skills
7. Readers are reminded the immigrant survivors of IPV come under the protection of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA)

Comments:
Generally useful information.

Accessibility:
Intended for psychotherapists and counselors, researchers

Key Points:
Due to sensitive nature of subject matter, accurate statistical data on issues related to domestic violence is extremely difficult to obtain.

As Fontes states "Participating in research might put (a subject) at risk psychologically, physically, socially, or politically." (p. 59)

These articles speak to two sets of problems in obtaining data:

1. Ellsberg, et al, found "focused" questionnaires on domestic violence (in Nicaragua) more effective than deriving data from general health surveys.
2. In both instances, clients' fear of inadequate privacy leads to underreporting of DV incidences. However, "the most important factors influencing disclosure are adequate training and support of interviewers that include such safety measures as guaranteed privacy." (p. 7-8)

Fontes examines researcher/subject power dynamics:

• "In a research setting the researcher is always more powerful than the participant." (p. 54)
• "Research and science are socially constructed concepts. Research is funded by those in power." (p. 55)
• Participation in a research project can bring harm to subject or her culture.
• Researchers are able to leave a setting; clients cannot, and are therefore vulnerable to consequences.

Both studies recommend providing post-interview counseling for subjects to process emotional material revealed during session.

Accessibility:
Intended audience: Psychotherapists. Contains technical language, statistical analysis.

Scope:
Author seeks to disprove previous studies suggesting higher rate of domestic violence in non-white families. Conducts careful study among women and children living in DV shelter.

Focus:
Author questions whether violence in the home a factor of ethnicity.

Findings:
Data suggests frequency and severity of violence correlated with economics and class, not race

As author herself suggests, study population is self-selected by virtue of having made the effort to leave an abusive relationship. Therefore data is tainted; group is not fully representative of general population.

Data regarding correlation of ethnicity and violence could prove significantly different among women who continued to live in abusive relationships. Therefore data in this study must be regarded skeptically.

Critique:
Study neither proves nor disproves earlier assertions regarding ethnicity and violence.

This article is brought to attention of readership as a cautionary guide. Even well-conducted studies may be tragically flawed.

Reader is cautioned to critically review data underlying every article, rather than accepting findings at face value.

Also, reader is encouraged to note the difficulty in obtaining accurate data among DV clients.

"Constructing and Negotiating Gender in Women’s Police Stations in Brazil," by Sara Nelson in LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE 1996:23(1): 131-148

"Peru: Law of Protections from Family Violence," by WOMEN’S RIGHTS DIVISION OF HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: 1-20.

Accessibility:
All three articles are directed toward the general public.

Key Points:
Brazil (followed by rest of Latin America) established female-run police stations in order to address the needs of abused women. Efforts to document and treat domestic violence have improved, but only slightly, under these programs.

All three articles find that deep-seated cultural prejudices against women prevent the programs from being more effective.

1. female police officers are granted lesser status, therefore less power to assist
2. laws and court actions are insufficient
3. women are requires to participate in reconciliation counseling with batterer before divorce proceedings can be brought

The Human Rights article makes several suggestions as to how medical and legal practitioners can remedy these problems.

Comments:

• These articles are relevant for all service providers.
• The underlying issue is that we may establish programs that sound productive in theory.
• However, vestiges of cultural and institutional prejudices against women may serve to undermine our best efforts at providing services.
• This is as true in the United States, as elsewhere

Accessibility:
General audience.

Scope:
Academicians and professionals discuss trafficking in various regions of the world.

Findings:
Increases in abusive sex trafficking facilitated by:

• changes in political boundaries (demise of soviet bloc, unification of Europe)
• new technologies in communication and transportation (sex tourism and internet pornography)
• economic globalization (increased availability of non-local goods, requiring cash)

Girls, women, boys kidnapped or falsely contracted, then take abroad, sold, resold.

Mostly in impoverished areas (S.E. Asia, Eastern Europe) but may be smuggled into US.

Implications for Service Providers:

• All should be on look out for trafficked individuals among clients (illegal immigrants, often drug addicted/physically abused )
• Advised to offer medical treatment, legal protection (political asylum)

Why Did They Kill? Cambodia in the Shadow of Genocide. Alex Hinton. University of California Press, 2005.

Accessibility:
Intended audience: academic anthropologists. Both books address abstract theoretical topics:

• Hinton, using primarily linguist analysis, looks at underlying cultural values that can be transformed into ideological propaganda in order to enable normally peaceful individuals to participate in genocidal activity.
• Ong looks at the issue of identity in relationship to the State among immigrant populations.

Who else might benefit?
Useful to service providers from every field who work with SE Asian immigrants. Both books identify Cambodian cultural values and customs.

Ong provides a potent critique of psych/ medical services to immigrants. Hinton’s discussion of status, shame, and violence useful for work with gangs.

Key Points: (Hinton)
Hinton identifies several cultural values that inhibit or promote violence:

1. Buddhist value of dissipating anger (inhibits violence)
2. Disproportionate revenge (promotes violence):
   • Taking “a head for an eye”,
   • Delivering greater punishment than original offense.
   • Need to fully eradicate offenders.
3. Patron/client system of reciprocal loyalty (promotes violence)
4. Buddhist notion of "impermanence" distorts into paranoia ever-present possibility of loyalty switching (promotes violence)
5. Valorization of desensitization (“cutting off the heart”) enabled individuals to commit atrocities (promotes violence)

Critique:
Hinton fails to consider pre-Khmer Rouge values regarding violence in the domestic front, both between family members and in relationship to animals. Not only would these findings greatly enhance the work of service providers, but Hinton’s omissions greatly weaken what is otherwise a brilliant theoretical analysis.

(Fortunately, Ong does not omit this information.)

Key Points: (Ong)
Ong discusses how Cambodian refugees in the Bay Area utilize welfare agencies to forge new world roles and identities (gender, family, power, healthcare, religion). Changes in these roles are specifically in relationship to the State.

Ong borrows from Foucault in critiquing power imbalances in the delivery of bio-medical healthcare:

Power imbalances are heightened when patient and health care providers have culturally different understandings of body and pathology.

Psychotherapists tend to assign pathologies (PTSD, depression) based upon patients’ communication and behavior during clinical visits, rather than understanding these as culturally-based responses to professionals (figures of authority). For example:

• It is inappropriate to verbally contradict an authority figure.
• Verbal passivity may mask shame at reporting condition
• Women experience deep shame when exposing genital regions (e.g. to ob/gyn)

Many older Cambodian refugees have witnessed (or in some cases perpetrated) extreme violence during the killing field episode. However, individual psychological responses may or may not replicate those demonstrated by individuals from other cultures.

Many women have been raped (and therefore are in need of counseling), but may be ashamed to discuss the incident(s) with professionals.

It is unclear as to actual rate of frequency of male–to-female spousal abuse in the home country (reports vary).

Once individuals become caught up in the role of victim receiving government assistance, reporting domestic violence increases attention from social workers and police. DV can become a bonding issue around which government workers and Cambodian immigrant women interact (p.143)).

Physicians may misdiagnose medical or psychiatric problems. These may be adjustment disorder related to new cultural conditions rather than a response to previous trauma.

Service providers can become overzealous and imposing “American”, rather than indigenous diagnoses and solutions on clients: “Refugee love may be considered a liberal variation of humanitarian domination, as enacted by refugee workers, social workers, the police, and some health providers, who in their various capacities provide pastoral care in the broadest sense to refugees. (p.146)”

Male and female roles reverse as women, in an advantageous position to receive AFDC, Medicare, etc. become primary economic providers for families.

Loss of male status leads to shame, and can foster vengeful activity, ie. DV.

Strengths/Limitations:
Ch. 1-7 are especially useful for service providers. (topics: domestic violence, social adaptations made by Cambodian immigrant community, critique of power dynamics in social services.)

Ong tends to treat informants as victims. She appears to be less willing than Hinton to acknowledge individual agency regarding participation in Cambodian genocidal violence.

Accessibility:

• intended audience: professional academic criminologists
• dense with statistical information and criminological jargon
• useful to police officers, prosecutors, and domestic violence advocates

Focus:
Authors point out several features of the criminal justice system that makes it less than user-friendly to immigrant victims of crime in general (especially in cases of domestic violence).

Scope:
Statistics derived from surveys and phone interviews with police chiefs and prosecutors.

Findings:
67% of the officials surveyed indicated that they sense a great amount of underreporting by immigrant crime victims

A breakdown of underreporting is as follows:

According to those surveyed there are a few basic reasons for underreporting:

1. fear of becoming involved with authorities
2. fear of embarrassing family
3. language and cultural barriers

The criminal justice system has made some efforts to erase barriers - 53% of those surveyed report they have some measure in place to counteract underreporting, including:

"The results suggest that many metropolitan areas have made some efforts to promote participation of immigrant victims in the criminal justice system. But far more needs to be done to ensure access to justice for this growing segment of society." (p. 183).

Comments:
This article is unique in that it contains statistical evidence to support popular notions about ways in which the Criminal Justice system fails to facilitate meaningful access to justice for immigrant crime victims. However, the reader should be aware that those surveyed were all from large US cities. Statistics could vary among rural populations.

Accessibility:

• Intended for academic and professional audience
• Technical language, psychological jargon, statistics
• May be useful to high school counselors, teachers, therapists, and community youth workers.

Scope:
Survey of 678 Latino youth (both genders) in six California high schools

Focus:
To identify certain characteristics of Latino youth that may serve as risk factors to teen dating violence.

Hypothesis:
There is a relationship between levels of acculturation and increased rates of dating violence. (Previous studies have suggested that rate of domestic violence increases with level of acculturation.)

Findings were inconclusive.

Key Points:

1. Statistics show a high rate of dating violence among high school students in general: “Between 12% and 35% of [all] high school students engage in or are victims of physical violence in a dating relationship” (273).
   
2. Authors suggest that pro violent attitudes about dating violence may increase the likelihood that actual future intimate violence will occur.
   
3. Authors suggest that the Latino youth population is high at risk for dating violence.

Comment:
Further study in this area is needed.

Accessibility:

• Intended for academic criminologists
• May also benefit police officers, prosecutors, and court
• Dense with criminological jargon, statistical charts, tables, and formulas

Scope:
Survey of police records and narratives from domestic violence calls to a police department in Texas.

Focus:
Study tests four hypotheses regarding successful delivery of justice to IPV victims:

1. unemployed women with children are less likely to take steps to promote prosecution
2. women who are charged with mutual combat and who are arrested are less likely to take steps to promote prosecution
3. African American and Hispanic women are less likely than their white counterparts to take steps to promote prosecution
4. women who live with their intimate partner are less likely to take steps to promote prosecution

Findings:

1. No significant relationship between ethnicity, employment status, and victim’s willingness to bring charges against perpetrator.
2. Women charged/arrested for mutual combat are less likely to take steps to promote prosecution.
3. Women who reside with their batterers are less likely to bring charges.

Key Points:

1. Statistics show a high rate of dating violence among high school students in general: “Between 12% and 35% of [all] high school students engage in or are victims of physical violence in a dating relationship” (273).
2. Authors suggest that pro violent attitudes about dating violence may increase the likelihood that actual future intimate violence will occur.
   
3. Authors suggest that the Latino youth population is high at risk for dating violence.

Comment:
Further study in this area is needed.

Accessibility:

• Intended for other academic criminologists
• May be beneficial to domestic violence advocates, counselors, and police officials
• Contains some criminological jargon, but no statistical information

Scope:
Author uses anthropological interviewing techniques to obtain data from subjects (an unusual technique in criminology).

Focus:
To identify characteristics of domestic violence specific to South Asian communities.

Findings:

1. Subjects defined domestic violence in terms of physical violence (as opposed to emotional, sexual, or financial abuse)
2. Low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression result from all forms of abuse
3. Subjects indicated that domestic abuse is unacceptable, countering stereotypes of South Asians as accepting IPV
4. Identified two forms of domestic violence specific to South Asian home:
   1. in-law abuse
   2. forced marriages
5. Barriers to disclosure reported by the South Asian women:
   1. fear of deportation
   2. fear of police
   3. language barriers
6. Additional cultural factors that influence failure to report:
   1. potential shame brought to the family honor
   2. buying into the patriarchal structure of society

Accessibility:

• Intended for criminologists involved in research
• Contains tables and graphs and some criminological jargon
• Criminological theory useful to all DV workers

Scope:
Reviews six theories explaining motives for violence against intimate partners

Findings:

1. The author presents a concise grid of six theories explaining domestic violence:

   Theory-Driven Preventive Implications for Domestic Violence

   Theory	Determinants	Focus of Intervention	Measures	Agency	Time Scale
   Feminist	Patriarchic society, male dominance, gender role assignments	Societal Changes Victim	Improve status of women Empowerment skills Equal rights education	Feminist groups, Governments Women's services	Long term
   Family violence research	Individual personality, psychopathology, substance abuse, family system, subculture	Abuser	Education, counseling, anger management, cognitive therapy	Police referrals Psychiatrists/social workers	Medium term
   Cultural analysis	Culture of origin, traditional beliefs and customs, socialization process, family dynamics	Societal change	Education, legislation, culture-sensitive support services	Society at large	Long term
   Acculturation	Immigrant syndrome, insecurity, isolation, alcohol/drugs, work & financial difficulties, language problems	Abuser and Victim	Counseling, interpersonal and coping skills, information about local culture and immigration rules	Family services, immigration clinics, victim services, health department	Medium term
   Victimological	Individual and cultural factors	Societal change Victim	Emancipation of women, sex education, equal opportunity education	Immigrant women advocates, local education departments	Long term
   Crime opportunities	Lack of guardianship, ready excuses, non-reporting of abuse	Abuser Victim	Community policing, neighborhood culture awareness, culture-sensitive training, information and outreach campaigns	Law enforcement, Immigrant community leaders, DV task force, counseling services	Short term

   
   
2. Natararjan finds that #6, Crime of Opportunity, is the primary reason for domestic violence in the South Asian home.
3. "The most useful intervention that can be undertaken at the present time is encouragement from the police for abused women in these communities to seek their protection." (317)

Accessibility:

• Intended for academicians, policy makers, and authors of legal matters
• Useful for police officers, prosecutors, and court advocates
• Moderate amount of criminological jargon, but no statistics

Scope:

• Details Vietnamese immigrant women’s experiences with domestic violence and the criminal justice system
• Based upon interviews with 34 Vietnamese women in four US communities

Findings:

1. "Resettlement in the United States has brought about changes in the family lives of many Vietnamese immigrants that…have a major impact on the likelihood of domestic violence" (41).
   Main factors:
   • men’s economic failure and women’s new elevated status
   • feelings of depression, jealousy, and powerlessness among men
   • inconsistency in gender-role expectations
2. "A variety of structural, cultural, and legal barriers have affected responses to abuse by Vietnamese immigrant women” (41).
   Main factors:
   • economic and cultural isolation
   • legal status in US
3. Concerns with consequences of criminal justice interventions from the interviewed women include:
   • arrest of abuser
   • possibility of losing income
   • criticism from other family and community members
4. Many shortcomings exist with current criminal justice policies in regards to these victims, for example:
   • mandatory arrest polices have increased the amount of Vietnamese abused women being arrested
   • police intervention may lead to family disputes/breakups which amplifies the devastating impact on women because of cultural beliefs about the significance of marriage
   • no-drop policies force women into prosecution and may increase the risk of retaliation from their abusers
   • language barriers at all levels of the criminal justice system may allow for family translators who may purposely translate what women say incorrectly

Accessibility:

• Intended for academic criminologists
• Moderate amount of professional jargon
• Beneficial to court advocates, police, prosecutors, and domestic violence advocates.

Focus:
Book, in its entirety, considers several aspects of the criminal justice system’s response to domestic violence.

Ch. 5 details aspects of the police-citizen encounter. It questions:

• why so few victims call the police
• why the criminal justice system is hesitant to become involved

Findings:

1. DV victims do not call the police for the following reasons:
   1. previous bad experiences with police
   2. fear of retribution from the offender
   3. fear of economic loss
   4. many victims suffer from PTSD in which a rational decision may become impossible
2. Ethnic communities are especially likely to underreport, due to:
   1. community pressure to not involve outsiders
   2. fear of the attention of immigration authorities
3. Police actions contribute to the low numbers of domestic violence cases entering the criminal justice system.
   1. Dispatchers who screen calls place DV calls as low priority
   2. Police unwilling to arrest domestic violence perpetrators

Accessibility:

• Semi-technical language.

Scope:

• International prevalence estimates of IPV during pregnancy range from 4% to 25%.

Focus:

• Identify prevalence of IPV during pregnancy.
• Examine risk factors associated with IPV during pregnancy.

Design:

• 914 women in their third trimester recruited from health care clinics in urban Mexico.
• Interviews conducted in Spanish.

Findings:

• 24% of women reported IPV before and 25% reported IPV during their pregnancy (not statistically significant).
• Physical and sexual violence decreased significantly during pregnancy, but emotional violence increased significantly.
• Younger age, low socioeconomic status, and violence prior to the pregnancy significantly associated with IPV during pregnancy.

Conclusions:

• Pregnancy is not an initiating factor for violence.
• Intergenerational violence is highly predictive of IPV during pregnancy.

Strengths/Limitations:

• Self-reports may lead to recall bias and underreporting.
• Very low refusal rate – less than 1% of women approached refused to participate.

Accessibility:

• Target audience includes social work researchers.
• Language and concepts are accessible to a much broader audience.

Scope:

• Article consists of a literature review of all social work articles addressing domestic violence between 1985 and 2000.
• Selection of 105 Social Work abstracts divided into 3 cohorts based on year of publication (1985-1990, 1991-1995, 1996-2000).
• Data was coded to determine and compare themes within and between cohorts.

Focus:

• To determine if there have been significant changes in the way in which the field of social work addresses the problem of domestic violence.

Findings:

• Several findings emerged:
  1. Naming the Issue: The first 2 cohorts (1985-1990, 1991-1995) had a much broader range of terminology used to describe domestic violence. The third cohort (1996-2000) had greater professional consensus in using the term "domestic violence."
  2. Listening to Women’s Voices: The data reflected an increase in the number of publications which examined survivors’ experiences, which is consistent with social work’s client-centered and strengths-based approaches.
  3. Addressing the Needs of Diverse Battered Women: Diversity issues were few and far between in first two cohorts. In the third cohort, researchers observed an “explosion” in the literature pertaining to DV in diverse populations. In descending order of frequency the following issues were addressed in the literature: race/ethnicity, economic status, sexual orientation, rural status, and disabilities. Articles relevant to the race/ethnicity category focused primarily on differences in intervention strategies and cultural barriers to working with women of non-European decent.
  4. Losing Theoretical Ground: Researchers found the amount of literature pertaining to the theoretical causes of domestic violence decreasing over time, while, the percentage of articles addressing policy, social work practice and educational approaches to intervention strategies remained static.

Conclusions:

• Researchers conclude that the field of social work has not significantly changed in its approach to DV.
• Article also demonstrates that the inclusion of diversity issues is relatively recent in the body of literature.

Reviewer's Comments:

It is concerning that only 105 journal articles between the years 1985 to 2000 qualified for inclusion in this study considering that magnitude of the problem and the amount of contact that social workers have with DV survivors. The article clearly demonstrates the need for increased research in the field.

Accessibility:

• Intended for clinical social workers or other professionals with theoretical background mental health practice.
• Useful to direct service providers working with survivors of domestic violence.

Focus:

• Article describes a theoretical framework grounded in “undermining oppressive beliefs” to guide direct practice with survivors of various forms of male violence against women, including domestic violence.

Key Points:

• Guidelines for direct practice:
  1. Theoretical framework of the clinician should “repoliticize” the violence in order to contextualize it within the problem violence against women in society.
  2. "When deconstructed, many laws, institutional structures, and official practices reveal how they encode and enforce oppressive customs and beliefs with regard to gender, privilege, power, and accountability and perpetuate personal acts of gender violence." These are often internalized by female survivors of gender-based violence and result in diminished feelings of self-worth.
  3. Clinicians must aim to deconstruct such "oppressive self-stories" and help empower clients to transform them.
• Description of the Emancipatory Principle to Undermine Oppressive Beliefs:
  1. Externalizing: Distinguishes the person from the problem; removes potential for self-blame for causing violence; enables the client to look at the problem from different perspectives. Worker may facilitate this process by referring to “the bruise,” “the depression,” etc. as opposed to the client’s bruise or her depression.
  2. Deconstructive Questioning: Connects client’s personal experience to overarching social and cultural beliefs about women and their role in society. This process questions the validity of such beliefs in order to elevate the client’s sense of self-worth. For example, to the woman who accepts the commonly held belief that she is responsible for making her heterosexual relationship succeed, every time she is victimized is evidence of her failure.
  3. Seeking Resistance and Defiance: Surviving DV inherently involves resistance and defiance, which may take different forms. This stage involves helping the survivor to recall such moments of defiance as a source of empowerment.
  4. Anchoring: Builds upon the previous stage. A process of rooting one’s current ability to resist in the past. Helps client to uncover her many sources of courage and strength that have been with her throughout her life, and she is able to draw from these in the future.

Conclusions:

• The emancipatory principle is rooted in the feminist theory of domestic violence
• Utilizes various clinical approaches including the strengths-based perspective, which concentrates on client strengths as opposed to deficits and the ecological model, which contextualizes the client’s experience within a larger framework.

Reviewer's Comments:

Article does not address the issue of cultural diversity and does not explicitly acknowledge that gender roles are not homogenous between cultures. The described principle may be useful in culturally diverse settings, but the clinician should explore the client’s beliefs about gender roles specific to her cultural background.

Accessibility:

• Most useful to direct service providers, domestic violence program implementers, or researchers.
• Includes clinical mental health terminology.

Scope:

• It does not directly address practice with immigrants, but effectively highlights the need for more rigorous research on the outcomes of specific interventions.
• 9 published articles about evaluation of social work interventions with DV survivors were analyzed based on types of services provided.

Focus:

• Article reviews research on the outcomes and effectiveness of social work interventions with domestic violence survivors.

Key Points:

• Services for survivors of domestic violence were categorized as: 1) shelter-based services, 2) non-shelter support groups, 3) shelter-based group treatment, 4) advocacy services, and 5) follow-up treatment.
• Group work is the most commonly utilized intervention with DV survivors.
• The most commonly employed theoretical models included feminist, cognitive, and social support frameworks.

Conclusions:

• There is an overall lack of research on the effectiveness of social work interventions with DV survivors.
• Research that has been published generally lacks methodological rigor in experimental design.

Reviewer's Comments:

There is a clear need for more evaluative research on specific interventions with DV survivors. The fact the immigrant populations were not addressed in this review only emphasizes the even greater need for additional research in this area with diverse populations.

"Analysis of the Family Violence Option: A Strengths Perspective" by J. Postmus in AFFILIA 2000; 15(2): 244-258.

Accessibility:

• Useful to individuals with background in welfare policy issues.
• Language is accessible to a broader audience.

Scope:

• Literature review of the research that has been conducted about the relationship between domestic violence and welfare policy.
• Special attention paid to the Family Violence Option (FVO), an amendment which was passed in 1996 to ensure that welfare agencies screen for domestic violence and provide appropriate referral services. Moreover, it waives domestic violence survivors of certain welfare requirements such as time restrictions, work requirements, etc.

Focus:

• To demonstrate both the strengths and shortcomings of welfare policy in relation to the problem of domestic violence.
• To critique the research that has been conducted on several aspects of the relationship between domestic violence and welfare policy
  1. Prevalence of domestic violence among women receiving welfare
  2. Relationship between domestic violence and employment status
  3. Domestic violence relationship to health and mental health, child support, and evaluations of welfare policies and programming.

Findings:

• Early literature on welfare dependence is comprised of two theories:
  1. The rational choice model, which states that there may be perceived greater utility in prolonged welfare receipt than work.
  2. The culture of welfare theory, which states that there is a socialization process, which promotes deviant values such as lack of work ethic and fosters prolonged dependence on welfare assistance.
• More recent research promotes the barrier model, which includes domestic abuse as a primary barrier to self-sufficiency. Barriers exist at many levels:
  1. Individual: Long-term physical, psychological, emotional and social effects of abuse
  2. Family: Escalation of family violence in attempts to escape abuse, manipulation of children as part of pattern of abuse
  3. Welfare System: Complexities of the system, lack of clear guidelines in determining who may be eligible for the FVO
  4. Community: Inadequate funding and resources for survivors’ complex needs
• Research demonstrates high prevalence of domestic violence among welfare recipients.
• Domestic violence may interfere with job stability.

Conclusions:

• FVO is a mechanism for preventive or intervention services.
• Current welfare policy evaluation focuses on the outcome of employment status; it is necessary that women’s safety also be measured as a success outcome.
• Collaboration between domestic violence and welfare policy research, two traditionally distinct fields, must continue to expand.

Reviewer's Comments:

Tolman & Raphael (2000) provide a very comprehensive and useful literature review of the research involving the relationship between welfare policy and domestic violence. The authors also present recommendations for future research.

Postmus (2000) offers an analysis of the Family Violence Option from a Social Work perspective.

Accessibility:

• Intended for professionals or academics with a background in welfare policy issues.
• Moderate amount of statistics
• Accessible to individuals with a social science background.

Scope:

• Survey of 836 low-income women receiving Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) or food stamps.
• History and severity of sexual assault, past threats of violence, past physical violence, current threats, current physical abuse, and psychological abuse were assessed.
• A modification of the Conflict Tactics Scale (Straus, 1979) and the Severity of Violence Against Women Scales (Marshall, 1992) were also utilized in the survey to determine presence and severity of intimate partner violence.

Focus:

• To explore the "interrelationships among ethnicity, public assistance, employment, and victimization"(p.127).

Key Points:

• Revealed that they had experienced domestic abuse by current partner than women not receiving welfare assistance.
• African Americans and European Americans experienced higher rates of abuse than Mexican Americans.
• Statistical analyses of employment and welfare receipt demonstrated that predictors of abuse differ by ethnic background.

Conclusions:

• Grouping women across ethnic backgrounds may mask differences in relation to domestic violence and welfare receipt.
• Similarly, grouping all women of color and then making a comparison to Caucasian women may also be deceptive, as it does not consider interethnic differences between women of color.

Reviewer's Comments:

Although the article has several acknowledged limitations (primarily related to sample selection biases), it provides a foundation for research that looks at distinctions between ethnic minorities. This is particularly important in light if the limited research that has addressed this issue.

Accessibility:

• Intended for professionals or academics with a background in welfare policy issues
• Moderate amount of statistics
• Accessible to individuals with a social science background

Scope:

• Cross-sectional study of 824 randomly selected women living in Humboldt Park, a low-income area of Chicago.
• Data among African American and Latina women age 18-55 were analyzed for the purposes of this study.

Focus:

• Research questions:
  1. Are abused women more likely to receive welfare assistance than non-abused women controlling for other factors?
  2. Does partner interference with work impact welfare status in a comparable way to physical abuse?
  3. Do differences in race or ethnicity affect the relationship between DV and welfare?

Key Points:

• Among African American women, only physical abuse increased probability of receiving welfare assistance significantly.
• Among Latinas, only direct work interference by one’s partner significantly increased probability of receiving welfare assistance.
• Prevalence of DV among Latinas was 15%, and the fact that physical abuse did not have a significant impact on welfare status may indicate that some Latina survivors of DV may have restricted access to welfare assistance for reasons including immigration status and language barriers.

Conclusions:

• Results suggest that interracial and ethnic differences in the relationship between domestic violence and welfare status do exist.
• "Gaining a more specific understanding of the effect of culture may help guide service providers to develop welfare-to-work programs that reflect the diverse conditions in which their clients are situated . . ." (p.250).

Reviewer's Comments:

Although the article does not specifically focus on immigration status, it raises the issue of immigration status as a potential barrier to services such as welfare and the FVO. This is an area that requires additional research.

Accessibility:

• Targeted to individuals involved in social work curriculum development.

Key Points:

• Article details an interdisciplinary law and social work curriculum for effective response to domestic violence. The authors present a strong case for the importance of such an interdisciplinary approach.

Reviewer's Comments:

Although not explicitly addressed, such an approach may be especially useful in work with immigrant populations because of the unique legal complications related to immigration status that immigrant DV survivors face.

Accessibility:

• Intended for clinical social work students.
• Book provides a series of in depth case studies of social work with DV survivors.

Key Points:

• Case study of “Faith” depicts a Kenyan immigrant who has been married to an abusive American man.
• Case analyses are contextualized in a multi-systemic approach to social work practice, including ecological systems theory, biopsychosocial model, strengths perspective, empowerment, cultural competence and oppression theory.

Accessibility:

• Intended for a general audience working with South Asian Immigrant women.
• Most useful to direct service providers.

Scope:

• Book was developed out of the experiences at Manavi, a non-profit organization which addresses issues concerning South Asian women in the US.
• Manavi is multi-service agency providing legal referrals, advocacy, medical/court accompaniment, job training, outreach education crisis intervention, counseling services, interpreter services (p.5).

Focus:

• To serve as an educational resource to enhance cultural competency working with South Asian survivors of domestic violence.

Key Points:

• The authors cite several aspects of Indian culture which influence dynamics within an a violent relationship (pp.22-23):
  1. Group more highly valued than the individual: South Asian women experiencing abuse may be reluctant to seek divorce in order to preserve family name and honor or to preserve siblings’ marriage eligibility
  2. Assertiveness is considered a negative personality trait: Women may avoid clearly stating their needs and may be confused when people in authority roles (e.g. lawyers or counselors) do not directly tell them what to do.
  3. Respect for authority: Battered women may seek validation of the abuse from family members who are in India, and therefore unaware of the abuse.
  4. Asian Indians sometimes perceive domestic violence to be something that occurs in lower classes: Well-educated and financially successful Indian immigrants may believe they are immune to IPV.
  5. Religious faith: Belief in karma may cause women to believe there is no means to escape the abuse or that the abuse is the result of their own actions in previous lives.
  6. Marriage is typically negotiated by the entire family and many women may fear that divorce can shame everyone involved in the process.
• Forms of Abuse: Elaboration of the power and control wheel in the context of Indian culture.
  1. Isolation upon immigration: an abusive husband may compound this by restricting activity and social relationships; may justify their actions by claiming that they will become too Americanized and betray their own culture.
  2. Control of Money: In Indian families, money is controlled by men even when a woman is working and earning her own money
  3. Intimidation/Threats: Fear that divorce would result in retaliation against family in India; dependent on husbands for legal immigrant status; threats to destroy victim’s reputation, for example, by saying that they have been unfaithful, which also ruins her family’s reputation
  4. Sexual Abuse: concept of marital rape is not typically present in Indian culture.
  5. Manipulating children: motherhood as central role, threats to send children to India, lying to children in order to alienate mother in the family
• Considerations for Direct Service Providers:
  1. If an Indian women is seeking outside help, she has likely run out of family support or resources.
  2. May have difficulty identifying abuse because she has been socialized to be tolerant. May feel like a traitor to her culture for discussing private issues with an outsider.
  3. Important for counselors to use unconventional techniques to foster a relationship such as home visits and sharing personal experiences.
  4. A direct suggestion to leave an abusive relationship may be unacceptable to the client unless strong trust has been built.
  5. Any police intervention is generally feared and may be regarded as a source of social embarrassment.
  6. Important to address the issues and skills needed to live alone.

Conclusions:

• Asian Indian survivors of domestic violence face several barriers to seeking services, many of which are rooted in cultural beliefs and practices.
• Service providers must be sensitive and accommodating to such issues.

Reviewer's Comments:

This book provides quite an in depth portrayal of the issues affecting Asian Indian women’s perceptions of domestic violence and barriers to seeking services. However, these findings are not research-based.

Accessibility:

• Intended for a general audience working with South Asian immigrant women.
• Most useful to direct service providers.

Scope:

• Research is based on qualitative, unstructured interviews with immigrant women from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh living in the US.

Focus:

• Article depicts 4 in-depth narratives of women’s experiences of isolation as a form of abuse.

Key Points:

• Social and familial isolation is highly correlated with physical abuse
• Narratives portray several manifestations of isolation including:
  1. Spousal isolation
  2. Isolation from friends and family
  3. Isolation from ethnic community

Conclusions:

• Isolation is exacerbated by language barriers, economic reliance and dependency on spouse for legal immigration status.
• Such isolation makes outreach and the provision of services to victims of domestic abuse very challenging.

Reviewer's Comments:

Although the narrative-style presentation is very useful in contextualizing marital isolation as a form of abuse, the article does not provide any substantial recommendations for effectively addressing the issue. Evaluation of community outreach initiatives to mitigate this problem is a necessary next step in research.

Accessibility:

• Accessible to a general audience
• Most useful to direct service providers or researchers working with South Asian immigrant women

Scope:

• Reflection on the domestic violence work done in the South Asian community in the US over the last 15 years.

Focus:

• Article is based upon existing research and author’s own experience working at Manavi, a South Asian women’s organization committed to ending violence against women.

Key Points:

• "Batterers often use 'culture' as a pretext to violence" (p.177).
• In author’s experience, the majority of DV survivors she was worked experience abuse related to fears and manipulation related to immigration status, which is often dependent upon one’s husband.
• Existent research has ignored South Asian women’s patterns of help-seeking behaviors and effective intervention strategies with this population.
• Barriers to help-seeking for South Asian women
  1. Personal: "losing face," marital failure, shaming her family
  2. Institutional: "The immigration and public benefit policies, child custody issues, financial demands of legal procedures, as well as language barriers, all conjoin to discourage South Asian women’s bids to escape abusive relationships" (p.181).
  3. Cultural: Marriage and mother as central identity for South Asian women
• Community-based organizations, including religious institutions, have largely denied the problem of domestic violence within the South Asian immigrant community.
• Grassroots organizations, such as Manavi, are largely volunteer based; therefore, they often lack trained professionals with knowledge of intervention strategies or laws which affect immigrant women.

Conclusions:

• Needs of South Asian survivors of domestic violence are extremely complex and require increased resources.
• Increased collaboration between grassroots organizations, such as Manavi, and mainstream organizations is needed to effectively address the problem.

Reviewer's Comments:

The information provided in the article may be useful to practitioners working with South Asian survivors of domestic violence. However, the information is descriptive and primarily not research-based.

Accessibility:

• Intended for individuals with a social science background, but language is accessible to a general audience
• Moderate amount of statistics
• May be useful to both clinicians and researchers

Scope:

• Research gathered as part of larger community-based study of 211 women of Japanese decent living in Los Angeles County.
• 169 of 211 participants reported at least one episode of IPV, and 129 women classified the act as abusive.
• The narratives on these 129 women were analyzed for the purposes of this study.

Focus:

• A community-based study of women of Japanese origin examining the socio-cultural influence on responses to intimate partner violence.

Findings:

• 71% (n=92) of women believed that their Japanese cultural background impacted their response to IPV.
• The following themes emerged:
  1. Conflict Avoidance: 45% of women who identified their cultural background as influential described behaviors and thought patterns designed to avoid conflict such as withholding emotions, “going with the flow,” and self-blame in instances of abuse.
  2. Value of Endurance: 23% of women identified culturally-based value placed on tolerating life’s difficulties without complaint, referring to the Japanese term “gaman.” This value was also bolstered by the history of hardships experienced by Japanese immigrants in the US.
  3. Acceptance of Male Domination: 36% of women made comments referring to the gender-based power differential in Japanese society.
  4. Value of Collective Family Welfare: 11% of women discussed the need to preserve the family unit despite abuse towards the woman or her child. One woman stated: " 'I think it is typical (of Japanese). Even if you are abused, you think that the children need both parents. Only for that reason alone, I stayed married. I wish I had time to think only about myself. (age 44, Japan-born English translation)' " (p. 218)
  5. Aversion to Help-Seeking: Shame and "Face Saving": 14% believed that there was a cultural expectations that marital troubles are to be kept within the family and not discussed with outsiders.

Conclusions:

• The author stresses the importance of understanding and contextualizing culturally-informed responses to domestic abuse; this is also necessary for designing appropriate and useful outreach services for diverse populations.
• The socio-cultural factors which have influenced responses to IPV have engendered a sense of meaning to their reactions to violence which may serve as a source of coping with abuse.

Reviewer's Comments:

This article highlights the necessity of developing culturally sensitive and appropriate domestic violence services. Although Japanese culture is addressed exclusively, the article provides a model for understanding the role of culture in the perception and response to domestic violence.

Accessibility:

• Intended for individuals with a social science background, but language is accessible to a general audience
• Moderate amount of statistics
• May be useful to both clinicians and researchers.

Scope:

• Several standardized research tools were utilized in this study:
  1. The Attitudes Toward Domestic Violence Questionnaire (designed by researcher)
  2. The Attitude Toward Women Scale
  3. The Marin and Marin Acculturation Scale
  4. The Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale

Focus:

• Telephone survey of 262 Chinese Americans
• Survey addressed:
  1. Definitions of domestic violence
  2. Beliefs about interpersonal violence
  3. Beliefs about the criminalization of domestic violence

Key Findings:

• Domestic violence overwhelmingly defined as physical or sexual violence.
• 25.6% believed that a victim must have caused the abuse
• 46.6% believed that it is easy for a victim to leave an abusive relationship
• Males were significantly more likely than women to support myths about DV, such as that the abuse is deserved and caused by the victim.
• 85% believed that family violence is a crime

Conclusions:

• There is a need to broaden the perceived definition of domestic violence to include verbal and emotional forms of abuse.
• Cognizance of cultural beliefs surrounding domestic violence is necessary for development of effective intervention strategies.

Reviewer's Comments:

The Attitudes Towards Domestic Violence Questionnaire may be a useful tool in future research. However, further research with a larger sample size is necessary to determine validity and reliability of specific items within the instrument.

The author presents potentially useful intervention strategies specific to the Chinese immigrant community.

Accessibility:

• Intended for clinical social workers involved in cross-cultural work
• Requires prior knowledge of Social Work Code of Ethics
• Topic/language easily accessible to non-social workers

Scope:

• Qualitative research study of Hmong community in Twin Cities, MN and Thailand
• Addresses participants’ perceptions of relational dynamics within their culture and community

Focus:

• Describes case study of family’s reaction to a woman’s wish to divorce abusive husband of 35 years. Response is to discourage divorce and police involvement.

Key Points:

• Shared meaning in clinical work: Mutual understanding and agreement of values. Presents significant challenges when clinician/client values differ substantially.
• Cultural themes affecting perceptions of and response to DV:
  1. Marriage protocols: Divorce is to be avoided
  2. General Attitudes towards DV à Range of viewpoints about acceptability of wife abuse
     • Woman may provoke abuse
     • Women may deserve abuse if they do not perform designated functions
     • Husbands may abuse due to a perceived loss of control upon immigration to the US
     • "Saving Face": Both men and women to deny domestic abuse in order to protect entire family from shame
     • Fair Justice: US justice system perceived as unfair to husbands because it "automatically" sides with women; police involvement discouraged in situations of DV; phenomenon also related to saving face.
     • Communication: Rigid and complex rules of communication affect who women may seek help from in cases of abuse and when it is appropriate to seek help.

Conclusions:

Implications for Social Workers:

• Conflicting values
  1. Safety of client is paramount to clinician
  2. Preservation of family honor paramount in Hmong culture
• Considerations and Dilemmas
  1. Extended family as important resource for support
  2. Ignoring Hmong system could alienate client from her own culture
  3. "How do we meet the obligation to protect individuals from danger and to honor diversity, when to attend to one may mean to compromise the other?" (p.51).

Reviewer's Comments:

This article is particularly useful because it depicts author’s interaction with a distinct culture and illuminates her own process of understanding conflicting cultural values. Valuable to any direct service providers engaging in any cross-cultural work, not exclusive to the Hmong population.

Accessibility:

• Intended for direct service providers, program developers and policy makers
• Heavily weighted with statistical material
• Less accessible to individuals without a social science background

Scope:

• Cross-sectional Survey of 67 Arab women who are survivors of IPV
• Researcher utilized the Conflict Tactics Scales, Revised (CTS2) to assess type and severity of domestic abuse and the Barriers Scale, which was modified to determine levels of barriers to accessing social, legal, and healthcare services

Focus:

• To determine the factors associated with barriers to utilization of domestic violence services among battered Arab immigrant women

Key Findings:

• Systemic barriers: lack of programs/services for Arab survivors of DV, negative staff attitudes, cost of services
  1. High cost of services (92.5%)
  2. Perceived disinterest by healthcare providers in investigating incidents of domestic abuse (65.6%)
  3. Lack of services targeting the specific needs of Arab survivors of domestic violence (47.8%)
• Personal resource barriers: language, level of education, income
  1. Little knowledge about types of services available or how these services function (92.5%)
  2. Lack of English literacy (70.1%)
  3. Lack of social support, e.g. no one available to accompany her to a service provider (74.6%)
• Cultural: stigma associated with DV, patriarchal culture, fear of community reaction
  1. Lack of family support network (82.1%)
  2. Fear of judgment from friends and relatives for seeking outside help (70.1%)
  3. Belief that friends/family would discourage seeking assistance (70.1%)
  4. Feeling embarrassed to seek medical attention (62.7%)
  5. Feeling embarrassed speaking to a social worker (49.3%)
  6. Belief that their religion discourages seeking outside assistance (43.3%)

Conclusions:

• Abused Arab immigrant women are most urgently in need of:
  1. Shelters/safe houses that are linguistically and culturally sensitive to Arab women and knowledgeable about immigration issues
  2. Increased involvement of medical professionals in identifying and addressing domestic violence with patients
  3. Increased participation of community-based organizations
  4. Providing information about economic resources and legal rights, preferably through community-based organizations.
  5. Increasing public awareness by disseminating information in Middle Eastern languages.
  6. Batterer-intervention services for men

Reviewer's Comments:

This was the only article I uncovered in my research which directly assessed barriers to domestic violence services within an immigrant population. Continued research in this area is needed to improve services and increase accessibility.

Accessibility:

• Intended for clinical social workers and other direct service providers working with Chinese-American survivors of domestic abuse.
• Language and concepts are accessible to a more general audience.

Scope:

• Comprehensive literature review of research involving issues affecting Chinese-American survivors of domestic violence.

Focus:

• To describe the experience of domestic violence in the Chinese-American community in order to provide a foundation for appropriate intervention strategies.

Key Points:

• Lee presents a context for working with Chinese-American battered women.
  1. Range of prevalence rates: Issue of underreporting
  2. Cultural issues which may challenge feminist theory
  3. Meanings associated with leaving an abusive relationship: displaying family weakness, shaming the family name, breaching the cultural values of perseverance, causing divorce
• Threats regarding immigration status as a form of abuse. (Clearly, this is not exclusive to Chinese-American community.)
• Considerations for clinical interventions
  1. Somatization of psychological/interpersonal problems
  2. There may be a large discrepancy between expressed level of emotion and the level of abuse
  3. Cultural value of "pragmatism": talk therapy approach may not initially seem useful; a case management approach providing concrete services (medical services, legal services, residential assistance, etc) may be necessary to engage client and demonstrate competency
• Three levels of intervention:
  1. Individual Level: Culturally-appropriate empowerment model
  2. Family System Level: Presents argument for couples therapy in the Chinese-American context. (N.B. Couples therapy is typically strongly discouraged as a domestic violence intervention strategy)
  3. Community level: Community education promoting the fact that domestic abuse in the US is illegal and that social services are available to protect victims; importance of collaboration between mainstream DV service providers and Chinese community organizations

Conclusions:

• Article addresses the specific needs and potential barriers to culturally appropriate domestic violence service within the Chinese-American community
• A three-tiered intervention strategy is presented

Reviewer's Comments:

As a theoretical foundation, the framework presented may be extended to inform practice with other immigrant populations. Additional research is needed to evaluate intervention strategies presented.

Accessibility:

• Intended for individuals with a social science background and, more specifically, social workers working with immigrant survivors of domestic violence.
• Language and concepts are accessible to a more general audience.

Scope:

• Qualitative pilot study (n=10) based on ethnographic interviews
• Sample selected from

Focus:

• Purpose of study
  1. To assess the degree to which cultural factor influence perceptions of domestic violence and help-seeking behaviors.
  2. To gather information about the effects of immigration status and related stressors on help-seeking behaviors.
• Research Questions:
  1. "Is there a relationship between the perceptions and attitudes of physical abuse held by battered, immigrant Mexican women and their help-seeking behaviors?"
  2. "Is there a relationship between cultural factors and the perceptions and attitudes about physical abuse held by battered, immigrant Mexican women and their subsequent help-seeking behavior?"
  3. "Is there a relationship between psychosocial stressors and the perceptions and attitudes about physical abuse held by battered, immigrant Mexican women and their subsequent help-seeking behavior?" (p.248).

Key Points:

• Findings of this indicate that cultural values play a more significant role than psychosocial stressors (e.g. immigration status, financial dependency, etc) in attitudes regarding help-seeking behaviors.
• Concern over child’s welfare acts both as a motivator and deterrent to seek help.
• Women tended to be more accepting of abuse their own relationships than abuse in hypothetical scenarios depicted during interviews ® indicates that psycho-educational groups where women share their experiences or discuss hypothetical situations may be a particularly useful intervention with this population.
• Changes in attitudes regarding the violence predominantly occurred only after some form of intervention.
• Central role of the family unit may signify a greater need for non-stigmatizing batterer services.

Accessibility:

• Intended for individuals with a social science background and, more specifically, social workers working with immigrant survivors of domestic violence
• Language and concepts are accessible to a more general audience
• Quantitative analysis with some statistical material

Scope:

• Based on focus group research with 18 abused women in Tokyo, Japan.
• Transcripts of the 4 focus groups were analyzed and coded to define emergent themes.
• Author presents implications for social work practice with Japanese immigrant survivors of domestic violence.

Focus:

• Investigation of perceptions of and responses to domestic violence
• Exploration of sociocultural and structural factors that may inhibit the ability to protect safety.

Key Points:

Themes identified:

• Entrapment: "situational context" of abuse; economic dependence; isolation from social support
• The attempt to "make sense" out of their experiences of violence.
• Survival and coping mechanisms
• Obstacles to safety: financial concerns, lack of social support, stereotypes about gender roles, lack of shelter services.

Conclusions:

• Infrastructure for services for domestic violence survivors in Japan are extremely lacking
• Author stresses the importance of community outreach to immigrant communities about differences in the social services available in the US as compared to in one’s country of origin.

Reviewer's Comments:

This article primarily addresses issues affecting domestic violence survivors in Japan. There is limited discussion of the implications for work with Japanese immigrants in the US; however, the article may provide useful contextual information for clinicians working with Japanese immigrant survivors of domestic violence.