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Running Head: RESEARCH PAPER

Maria-Antonieta Gomez

HD 300 Early Childhood Themes and Life Cycles Issues

Professor: Dr. Marilyn Davis

Research Paper

04/18/2017
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Running Head: RESEARCH PAPER

Intimate Partner Violence

The way you live with your partner once you are together or married affects how

you will live the rest of your life. If your relationship with your partner is good, then you

will be happy. But if you are constantly fighting and violence is involve then this can lead

to a serious traumatizing experience. The people who survive partner violence may have a

hard time self-advocating to the life afterwards. But it may also have an impact on their

culture, such as arts, music, or intellectual achievement.

Domestic violence may have serious consequences on the women that suffer from

it. A consequence may be a mental health issue. For example in the article, “ Mental ill

health in structural pathways to women’s experiences of intimate partner violence,” the

authors, Mercilene T. Machisa1, Nicola Christofides, and Rachel Jewkes state, “ Fifty

percent of women experienced IPV in their lifetime and 18% experienced IPV in the 12

months before the survey. 23% of women were depressed, 14% binge drank and 11.6% had

PTSD symptoms.” So, even though women may survive from intimate partner violence, the

outcome may lead to a mental health disorder such as PTSD or binge drinking. PTSD is a

post-traumatic stress disorder. This can happen because of many past experiences, such as

intimate partner violence.

Intimate partner violence may also have an effect on children if there are children in

the marriage. Even though the domestic violence is happening between the partners, the

children are greatly affected by this. In the article, “The Effects of Intimate Partner

Violence Exposure on the Maternal Bond and PTSD Symptoms of Children,” by the
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Running Head: RESEARCH PAPER

authors Boeckel, Mariana Gonçalves Wagner, and Adriana Grassi-Oliveira, Rodrigo, state,

Correlation analyses showed a positive association between the severity of IPV,

PTSD symptom severity in children, and difficulties of emotional regulation in

mothers. They also showed a negative association between IPV and the quality of

the maternal bond. Regression models demonstrated that exposure to sexual IPV,

maternal difficulties in emotion regulation, and younger age of the mother are

important predictors of lower quality of the maternal bond.

Since the mothers have PTSD from intimate partner violence then that is going to greatly

affect the relationship that they have with their children. It can affect their maternal bond

and therefor the children are now the ones that are affected. If the child sees that the mom is

being attacked by the dad, then the child will want to do the same thing or will hate the

mother or father. If it is possible, there should not be any discussions in front of children.

Intimate partner violence may also affect the culture of the victim. The victim may

be the husband or the wife. Although the victim is always the wife, there have been cases

where the husband is maltreated by the wife. The way that intimate partner violence affects

their culture is by affecting their ability to work and cope with society. But if you look at it

on the positive side, many victims use arts or some sort of cultural activity to help deal with

their traumatic experience. Intimate partner violence also affects more Hispanic-American

women than any other culture. For example in the article, “Intimate Partner Violence and

its Resolution among Mexican Americans,” the author, Finfgeld-Connett, Deborah, states,

Based on the findings, IPV is fueled by aspects of Mexican culture, and barriers

exist that make its resolution challenging. Despite attempts to nurture themselves,
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Running Head: RESEARCH PAPER

abuse becomes intolerable, and women eventually reach out for help. Immigration,

legal, criminal justice, and social service personnel assist Mexican American

women to resolve IPV.

Apparently a lot of the intimate violence that occurs within Mexican Americans has

to deal with their culture, according to the article. Maybe this is true because in Mexico the

men are classified of being “machistas” or overly manly. They think that the man should

have full power of the relationship and that women should only know how to cook and take

care of the house and family. When something is not right, the husband will either use

physical or verbal violence to hurt the woman. Fortunately now a days, more women are

opening up and starting to be more aware of the help that they can get if they suffer from

IVP (intimate domestic violence).

IVP is a consequence of not enough communication between the relationship, but it

is certainly not ok. It does not matter if the victim is a male or female. Using physical

aggression of verbal violence will have an effect on the victim and other people surrounded

by the violence.