“I Didn’t Really Have Anybody to Turn To”: Barriers to Social Support and the Experiences of Male Perpetrators of Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract

Social support is crucial for adapting to stress and trauma, processing adverse emotions, developing better mental health, and garnering relationship success. Yet, social support may not always be accessible to those who need it the most. Through participant observation and in-depth interviews, this study examined how men who have perpetrated intimate partner violence (IPV) perceived the availability and adequacy of social ties, as well as how they discursively constructed social support during times of childhood adversity. Results indicated a prevalence of trauma in attachment relationships, a lack of perceived social support, and persistent messages that discouraged help seeking and engendered masculine norms (e.g., self-reliance, aggression, rejection of femininity, restrictive emotionality) and communication styles. The current study illustrates how the effects of adverse childhood experiences may be exacerbated by the absence of positive social ties and adherence to masculine gender norms governing communication. Thus, the protective benefit (or the “buffering effect”) of social support appears to be inaccessible for this specific population. Findings suggest so-called “batterer intervention program” groups could provide measures to increase perpetrators’ sense of social support during the intervention process and work to deconstruct additional masculine gender beliefs (i.e., in addition to power and control) to alleviate some of social and psychological effects of early childhood adversity.