annotated bibliography of new zealand research into family violence

chronicity; type of act; and profession of respondent. Both police and social workersessentially viewed all situations involving intrafamilial sexual contact with children as seriousand likely to be harmful. Numerous interaction effects demonstrate the complexity of therating task and necessitate the use of caution when interpreting main effects. Exploratoryfactor analytic procedures were employed in an attempt to clarify the dimensions along whichjudgerants of seriousness and likelihood of long-term emotional trauma were made. Theseanalyses suggest that subjects discriminated among scenarios primarily on the basis of thetype of act and the age of the child. As in previous studies, incest blame was observed to be amultidimensional construct, as evidenced by the emergence of four blame attribution factors:representing offender; societal; situational; and victim factors respectively, in descendingorder of blame. Varying patterns of agreement and disagreement were identified as a functionof the respondent’s profession and gender. Implications for practice are discussed, along withrecommendations for future research.Source: Author’s abstractPotter, K., Martin, J., & Romans, S. (1999). Early developmental experiences of female sex workers:A comparative study. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 33(6), 935-940.See: www.nzfvc.org.nz/13005.pubTopic Areas: Child abuse and neglect, Physical abuse, Sexual abuse, Families, Women,ChildrenAbstract: This article examines the early childhood and family experiences of 29 of femalesex workers in New Zealand. Participants originated from Dunedin and Wellington, and wererecruited via the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective using the snowball method. The resultswere compared with data from the Otago Women’s Child Sexual Abuse (OWCSA) study.More than 80% of the sample had at least one experience of physical violence before the ageof 16 years, and in all but one of the cases the offender was a relative. Additionally, theparticipants were more likely than the sample of women from the OWSCA study to haveexperienced sexual abuse as a child. The sample of sex workers were also more likely tooriginate from a family characterised by discord and poor relationships, with the parentsreported as less caring compared to the OWSCA sample. The authors acknowledge thelimitations of the study, including the small sample size, the use of retrospective data, and thedifficulty determining the representativeness of the findings.Pouwhare, T. (1999). Maori women and work: The effects of family violence on Maori women’semployment opportunities. Wellington, New Zealand: National Collective of IndependentWomen’s Refuges.See: www.nzfvc.org.nz/12070.pubTopic Areas: Intimate partner abuse, Physical abuse, Psychological/emotional abuse,Women, Maori, Cultural factors, Health, EducationAbstract: This report discusses and analyses the effects of family violence on Maoriwomen’s employment opportunities. The research was undertaken through individualinterviews and focus groups with 30 women and is framed within the wider context of Maoriwomen’s experiences of employment and family violence. The report argues that bothemployment and education policies have increasingly marginalised Maori women and thatfamily violence intensifies this marginalisation. This is seen in unemployment and familyviolence statistics, in which Maori women are consistently over-represented. The author alsoargues that in addition to the negative health and wellbeing outcomes that family violencepresents to women, Maori women’s employment is affected through their partner coming to152