Publications by Year: 1998

1998
Sutherland C, Sullivan CM, Bybee DI. The long-term effects of battering on women's health. Women's Health. 1998;4 (1) :41-70. Publisher's VersionAbstract

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9520606

*The full article is available through this link. This article may be available free of charge to those with university credentials.

We examined the effects of intimate violence on the physical and psychological health of women over time. Changes in levels of physical and psychological abuse, injuries, physical health symptoms, anxiety, and depression were assessed three times: immediately after exit from a domestic violence program and at 81/2- and 141/2-month follow-ups. Analyses showed a significant decline in abuse, physical health symptoms, anxiety, and depression over time. Longitudinal structural equation modeling demonstrated that ongoing abuse was significantly related to increased physical and psychological health problems from one time period to the next, even when prior levels of physical and psychological health were controlled. Within each time interval, the effects of abuse on physical symptoms appeared to be mediated through anxiety and depression; although this relationship was replicated at several time points, the mediation was not verified across time, probably because measurement intervals were too long to reflect the underlying causal sequence. Although injuries were the direct result of abuse, injuries showed no significant effect on physical symptoms, anxiety, or depression. Implications for intervention and future research are discussed.

Fleury RE, Sullivan CM, Bybee DI, Davidson WS. "Why don't they just call the cops?": Reasons for differential police contact among women with abusive partners. Violence and Victims. 1998;13 (4) :333-346. Publisher's VersionAbstract

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10328442

*The full article is available through this link. This article may be available free of charge to those with university credentials.

Incidents of domestic violence are frequently not reported to police (e.g., Johnson, 1990; Langan & Innes, 1986; Roy, 1977), and people commonly assume that women's reasons for not calling about violence by a current or former partner are intrapersonal (e.g., shame, embarrassment, love). However, few researchers have asked battered women themselves about the frequency of their police contacts and their reasons for not calling the police. In this study, participants were recruited from a battered women's shelter and asked about their experiences with the police over the prior 6 months. Two thirds of the sample had had contact with the police during that time, but most did not have as much contact with the police as they had needed. Women gave multiple reasons for not calling the police; these reasons frequently included situational barriers, such as being physically prevented from using the telephone and/or being threatened with more violence. Only 3% of the sample reported that shame, embarrassment, or love were their sole reasons for not calling the police. Underreporting was related to previous (negative) experience with the police, as well as to the level of violence experienced. The practical implications of these findings are discussed.