This annual report - Taranaki District Health Board

FAMILY VIOLENCEIntroductionTe Rito, the New Zealand Family Violence Prevention Strategy defines family violence as:“a broad range of controlling behaviours commonly of a physical, sexual and/orpsychological nature, which typically involve fear, intimidation and emotional deprivation. Itoccurs within close interpersonal relationships.”[194]Family violence encompasses violence between any members of a family group orwhānau. Children exposed to inter-partner violence (violence between adult partners) areat increased risk of behavioural and emotional problems, including childhood traumasymptoms, and also experience higher rates of other types of child maltreatment[297,298,299]. There has also been concern that exposure to inter-parental violence mayencourage the development of later violence in children [300]. For example, a metaanalysispublished in 2000 found a weak to moderate association between exposure tointer-parental violence during childhood and subsequent inter-partner violence [301].However, after controlling for confounding factors such as socioeconomic background,associations between childhood exposure to inter-parental violence and subsequentincreased risks of inter-partner violence perpetration and victimization and violent crime,were reduced to statistical non-significance in a New Zealand prospective cohort [300].In terms of the prevalence of family violence in New Zealand, 24% of the 980 children inthe Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study reported seeing or hearingviolence or threats of violence between parents or parental figures [302]. Regardless ofwho carried out the violence, 64% of young people witnessing family violence describedthemselves as being upset “a lot” or “extremely” and a further 23% reported being “a bit”upset. A more recent survey of 2,077 New Zealand children aged 9 to 13 years found that27% reported having witnessed violence against an adult [303]. Similarly, the Youth’07survey of 9,107 secondary school students found that 48.2% of students reportedwitnessing adults yelling or swearing at each other in the previous 12 months, and 10.4%reported witnessing adults hitting or physically hurting each other (an increase from 5.6%in the 2001 survey) [290]. Students that had experienced or witnessed violence in theirhome reported depressive symptoms than those who had not (males 12.6% compared to5.7%; and females 25.9% compared to 11.3%).Both males and females may be victims and perpetrators of family violence, although maleperpetrators are more likely to seriously injure or kill the women and children they areviolent towards [300,304]. Family violence can affect families from all socioeconomicbackgrounds, but higher rates of inter-partner violence have been identified among young,cohabiting adults of low socioeconomic status, particularly when they have children [305].Internationally, inter-partner violence has also been linked to poverty and heavy alcoholconsumption [306]. An analysis of data from the New Zealand National Survey of CrimeVictims 2001 found that the strongest predictors of being a victim of inter-partner violenceover a lifetime were being Māori, aged 25 to 39 years, female, a solo parent, living in anover-crowded household, on social welfare benefits, and being divorced or separated[307]. A secure attachment to a non-violent parent or other significant carer has been citedconsistently as an important protective factor for children exposed to family violence [308].The following section reviews the number of Police family violence investigations occurringduring 2009–2011. In interpreting these figures, it must be remembered that researchsuggests that Police are only involved in around 10% of the family violence incidentsoccurring in New Zealand each year [309]. Thus these figures need to be viewed as the“tip of the iceberg” in terms of prevalence. Further, trends may also be sensitive to publicawareness campaigns and changes in the way the Police recognise and record familyviolence incidents. Despite this, it is hoped that these figures will provide some insightsinto the context surrounding family violence in New Zealand.Family Violence - 339