Seeking Help From Police for Intimate Partner Violence: Applying a Relationship Phase Framework to the Exploration of Victims’ Evolving Needs

Abstract

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a pervasive social problem requiring multiple levels of intervention across sectors. Women experiencing IPV often seek assistance from police. Such help-seeking efforts are frequently perceived as problematic by both victims and police. A deeper understanding of victims’ needs than is currently evident in the literature is needed to facilitate an appropriate, victim-centered police response across a diverse range of victim presentations. Applying a symbolic interactionist and feminist perspective and guided by a constructivist grounded theory approach, this qualitative study aimed to explore the application of Landenburger’s model of entrapment in and recovery from violent relationships to understand victims’ help-seeking needs when accessing police services. Semistructured interviews were conducted with 16 female victims residing in the culturally diverse Western metropolitan region of Melbourne, Australia. Fourteen victims participated in follow-up interviews. All victims primarily sought to stop the violence and hoped to find a powerful ally in police. Additional help-seeking needs were identified; subtle variations in victims’ aspirations for safety, ego-support, and justice were found across the binding, enduring, disengaging, and recovery relationship phases. Victims progressed from focusing only on the immediate violent event during the binding phase to seeking to maintain long-term safety and exert their rights to protection and freedom from abuse in the recovery phase. While the operational response of police is dependent on level of violence and immediate concerns for victims’ physical safety, victims’ help-seeking aims are very much contingent upon their relationship phase and the associated strategies for managing the violence they use. In particular, this study provides insight into the needs of women in the enduring relationship phase, when factors such as diminished agency and low expectations of legal protection were found to constrain victims’ help-seeking aspirations, sometimes eventuating in a cycle of chronic police intervention.

Keywords

domestic violence legal intervention perceptions of intimate partner violence help-seeking police relationship phases

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Al-Yaman

Van Doeland

Wallis

(2006). Family violence among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (AIHW Cat. No. IHW17). Canberra: Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.

Anderson

D. K.

Saunders

D. C.

(2003). Leaving an abusive partner: An empirical review of predictors, the process of leaving, and psychological well-being. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 4, 163-191. doi:10.1177/1524838002250769

Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2013). Personal safety, Australia, 2012 (ABS Cat. No. 4906.0). Canberra. Retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/4906.0Chapter7002012

Australian Law Reform Commission. (2010). Family violence—A national legal response (ALRC Report 114, NSWLRC Report 128). Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.

Baker

C. K.

Cooke

S. L.

Norris

F. H.

(2003). Domestic violence and housing problems: A contextual analysis of women’s help-seeking, received informal support, and formal system response. Violence Against Women, 9, 754-783. doi:10.1177/1077801203009007002

Barrett

B. J.

St. Pierre

(2011). Variations in women’s help seeking in response to intimate partner violence: Findings from a Canadian population-based study. Violence and Victims, 17, 47-70. doi:10.1177/1077801210394273

Beaulaurier

R. L.

Seff

L. R.

Newman

F. L.

Dunlop

(2007). External barriers to help seeking for older women who experience intimate partner violence. Journal of Family Violence, 22, 747-755. doi:10.1007/s10896-007-9122-y

Burke

J. G.

Denison

J. A.

Gielen

A. C.

McDonnell

K. A.

O’Campo

(2004). Ending intimate partner violence: An application of the transtheoretical model. American Journal of Health Behavior, 28, 122-133.

Burke

J. G.

Mahoney

M. A.

Gielen

McDonnell

K. A.

O’Campo

(2009). Defining appropriate stages of change for intimate partner violence survivors. Violence and Victims, 24, 36-51.

10.

Campbell

J. C.

Webster

Koziol-McLain

Block

Campbell

Curry

M. A.

. . . Laughon

(2003). Risk factors for femicide in abusive relationships: Results from a multisite case control study. American Journal of Public Health, 93, 1089-1097.

11.

Chang

J. C.

Dada

Ashton

Hawker

Cluss

P. A.

Buranosky

Scholle

S. H.

(2006). Understanding behavior change for women experiencing intimate partner violence: Mapping the ups and downs using the stages of change. Patient Education and Counseling, 62, 330-339.

12.

Charmaz

(2006). Constructing grounded theory: A practical guide through qualitative analysis. London, England: SAGE.

13.

Charmaz

(2009). Shifting the grounds: Constructivist grounded theory methods for the twenty-first century. In Morse

J. M.

Stern

P. N.

Corbin

Bowers

Charmaz

Clark

A. E.

(Eds.), Developing grounded theory: The second generation (pp. 127-154). Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.

14.

Clough

Draughon

J. E.

Njie-Carr

Rollins

Glass

(2014). “Having housing made everything else possible”: Affordable, safe and stable housing for women survivors of violence. Qualitative Social Work, 13, 671-688. doi:10.1177/1473325013503003

15.

Council of Australian Governments. (2009). National plan to reduce violence against women and their children: Including the first three year action plan. Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia. Retrieved from http://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/05_2012/national_plan.pdf

16.

Cox

(2016). Violence against women in Australia: Additional analysis of the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Personal Safety Survey, 2012 (ANROWS Horizons: 01.01/2016 Rev.ed.). Sydney: Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety.

17.

Crime Statistics Agency. (2017). Key figures year ending 31st December 2016. Retrieved from https://www.crimestatistics.vic.gov.au/media-centre/news/key-figures-year-ending-31-december-2016-0

18.

Denzin

N. K.

Lincoln

Y. S.

(1998). The landscape of qualitative research: Theories and issues. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

19.

Fanslow

J. L.

Robinson

E. M.

(2010). Help-seeking behaviors and reasons for help seeking reported by a representative sample of women victims of intimate partner violence in New Zealand. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 25, 929-951. doi:10.1177/0886260509336963

20.

Fleury-Steiner

R. E.

Bybee

D. I.

Sullivan

C. M.

Belknap

Melton

H. C.

(2006). Contextual factors impacting battered women’s intentions to reuse the criminal legal system. Journal of Community Psychology, 34, 327-342. doi:10.1002/jcop.20102

21.

Gillis

J. R.

Diamond

S. L.

Jebely

Orekhovsky

Ostovich

E. M.

MacIsaac

. . . Mandell

(2006). Systemic obstacles to battered women’s participation in the judicial system: When will the status quo change? Violence Against Women, 12, 1150-1168. doi:10.1177/1077801206293500

22.

Gover

A. R.

Paul

D. P.

Dodge

(2011). Law enforcement officers’ attitudes about domestic violence. Violence Against Women, 17, 619-636. doi:10.1177/1077801211407477

23.

Griffing

Ragin

D. F.

Sage

R. E.

Madry

Bingham

L. E.

Primm

B. J.

(2002). Domestic violence survivors’ self-identified reasons for returning to abusive relationships. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 17, 306-319.

24.

Hoyle

Sanders

(2000). Police response to domestic violence: From victim choice to victim empowerment? The British Journal of Criminology, 40, 14-36.

25.

Herman

J. L.

(1992). Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence – from domestic abuse to political terror. New York, NY: HarperCollins.

26.

Johnson

I. M.

(2007). Victims’ perceptions of police response to domestic violence incidents. Journal of Criminal Justice, 35, 498-510.

27.

Johnson

R. R.

(2004). Police officer frustrations about handling domestic violence calls. The Police Journal, 77, 207-219.

28.

Kirkwood

(1993). Leaving abusive partners. London, England: SAGE.

29.

Landenburger

(1989). A process of entrapment in and recovery from an abusive relationship. Issues in Mental Health Nursing, 10, 209-227.

30.

Landenburger

(1998). The dynamics of leaving and recovering from an abusive relationship. Clinical Issues, 27(6), 700-706.

31.

Leisenring

(2012). Victims’ perceptions of police response to intimate partner violence. Journal of Police Crisis Negotiations, 12, 146-164.

32.

Lipsky

Caetano

Field

C. A.

Larkin

G. L.

(2006). The role of intimate partner violence, race, and ethnicity in help-seeking behaviors. Ethnicity & Health, 11, 81-100. doi:10.1080/13557850500391410

33.

Logan

T. K.

Walker

(2004). Separation as a risk factor for victims of intimate partner violence: Beyond lethality and injury: A response to Campbell. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 19, 1478-1486. doi:10.1177/0886260504269699

34.

Mead

G. H.

(1964). On social psychology: Selected papers, edited and with an introduction by Anslem Stauss. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. (Original work published 1934)

35.

Milberger

Israel

LeRoy

Martin

Potter

Patchak-Schuster

(2003). Violence against women with physical disabilities. Violence and Victims, 18, 581-591.

36.

Moe

A. M.

(2007). Silenced voices and structured survival: Battered women’s help seeking. Violence Against Women, 13, 676-699. doi:10.1177/1077801207302041

37.

Mouzos

Makkai

(2004). Women’s experiences of male violence: Findings from the Australian component of the international violence against women survey (IVAWS) (Research and Public Policy Series No. 56). Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology.

38.

Olesen

V. L.

(2000). Feminisms and qualitative research at and into the millenium. In Denzin

N. K.

Lincoln

Y. S.

(Eds.), The Sage handbook of qualitative research (2nd ed., pp. 215-255). London, England: SAGE.

39.

Prochaska

J. O.

DiClemente

C. C.

(1982). Transtheoretical therapy: Towards a more integrated model of change. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice, 19, 276-288.

40.

Ragusa

A. T.

(2012). Rural Australian women’s legal help seeking for intimate partner violence: Women intimate partner violence victim survivors’ perceptions of criminal justice support services. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 28, 685-717. doi:10.1177/0886260512455864

41.

Russell

Light

(2006). Police and victim perspectives on empowerment of domestic violence victims. Police Quarterly, 9, 375-396. doi:10.1177/1098611104264495

42.

Simmons

C. A.

Farrar

Frazer

Thompson

M. J.

(2011). From the voices of women: Facilitating survivor access to IPV services. Violence Against Women, 17, 1226-1243.

43.

Stephens

B. J.

Sinden

P. G.

(2000). Victims’ voices: Domestic assault victims’ perceptions of police demeanor. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 15, 534-547.

44.

United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. (2013). Agreed conclusions on the elimination and prevention of all forms of violence against women and girls. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/csw/csw57/CSW57_Agreed_Conclusions_(CSW_report_excerpt).pdf

45.

Victoria Police. (2010). Code of practice for the investigation of family violence (2nd ed.). Melbourne, Australia: Victoria Police. Retrieved from http://www.police.vic.gov.au/retrievemedia.asp?Media_ID=464

46.

Victoria Police. (2014). Crime statistics 2013/2014. Retrieved from http://www.police.vic.gov.au/crimestats/ebooks/1314/index.html#I/z

47.

Walker

L. E. A.

(2009). The battered woman’s syndrome (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Springer.

48.

Walsh

McIntyre

S.-J.

Brodie

Bugeja

Hauge

(2012). Victorian systematic review of family violence deaths: First report. Melbourne, Australia: Coroners Court of Victoria.

49.

Whiting

J. B.

Oka

Fife

(2012). Appraisal distortions and intimate partner violence: Gender, power, and interaction. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 38, 133-149. doi:10.1111/j.1752-0606.2011.00285.x

50.

Wolf

M. E.

Hobart

M. A.

Kernic

M. A.

(2003). Barriers to seeking police help for intimate partner violence. Journal of Family Violence, 18, 121-129.

51.

Wuest

Merritt-Gray

(1999). Not going back: Sustaining the separation in the process of leaving abusive relationship. Violence Against Women, 5, 110-133.