Researching Violence Against Women: A Practical Guide for ... - Path

CHAPTER SIX
neighborhood of poor urban dwellers or in
a small village composed only of members
of an ethnic minority may be
Prevalence studies need to critically important for designing
local interventions.
have clearly defined criteria
for determining what acts are However, because such a study
considered as violence. does not include large sectors
of the population, such as rural
or middle class women or women of different
religious or ethnic backgrounds, it is
less useful for understanding how different
women experience violence. Moreover,
such studies are often dismissed as being
too narrow, and have little effect on policy.
DEFINITIONS OF VIOLENCE
Who defines abuse?
The way in which violence is defined has
an enormous impact on the final results.
Thus, it is crucial to establish from the
beginning how violence will be defined and
who will be considered a “case of abuse,”
to borrow a term from epidemiology.
The following are examples of criteria
that have been used in studies of intimate
partner violence:
■
■
■
■
■
■
Any kind of physical, sexual, or emotional
violence by any perpetrator at
any time.
One or more acts of physical violence
by a partner at any time.
Only physical violence of a certain level
of severity, or which has been repeated
a certain number of times.
Only acts of partner violence occurring
in the last year.
Economic, as well as physical, sexual,
or emotional violence.
Any behavior that women themselves
identify as abusive by virtue of its intent
or effect (this may include such diverse
acts as infidelity, verbal aggression or
humiliating acts, coerced sex, or refusing
to pay for household expenses).
How does one decide whether to use
definitions developed according to criteria
established by researchers, or to focus on
acts which women themselves view as
most harmful? The danger in relying exclusively
on women’s own definitions of
abuse, referred to in social science as an
“emic” approach, is that these may vary so
greatly from one woman to the next, and
between cultures, that it may not be possible
to draw meaningful conclusions from
the results. For example, the question,
“Have you ever been abused by your partner?”
is likely to underestimate the true
occurrence of violence. Many women may
experience severe physical violence and
yet not identify this behavior as abusive,
either because they are used to it or
because such behavior is considered normal
in their culture. Other women may
answer positively, citing verbal offenses or
humiliations as evidence of abuse. This
information may help the researcher
understand how different women perceive
violence, but it is less useful in planning
interventions or making cross-cultural
comparisons.
One advantage of using externally
derived definitions—an “etic” approach—is
that this enables the researcher to make
comparisons across different groups of
women. The most common method is to
ask women whether they have experienced
a series of behaviorally specific acts
of physical, sexual, or emotional violence,
such as hitting, slapping, kicking, or forced
sex. Women who disclose violence are
then asked to specify their relationship to
the perpetrator and the frequency or
period in which it took place. The drawback
of this approach is that you cannot
know whether these acts have the same
90 Researching Violence Against Women