Intimate Partner Violence: Towards a More Comprehensive Understanding of Maladaptive Coping in Relationships

People tend to think that domestic violence doesn’t happen to folks like them. “That only happens to other people,” is a common thought. But, violence happens to people just like us, no matter who we are. Domestic violence is experienced by those in every age group, race, ethnicity, culture, social class and sexual orientation. And, whether the parties involved are married and living in the same home, or just dating more casually, violence knows no boundaries. Intimate partner violence is an equal opportunity phenomenon. According to recent statistics, the Domestic Violence problem in the United States may be generating nearly 8 million victims per year.

This is an intermediate level, comprehensive course which presents 13 documents for perusal. Groundbreaking work by Lenore Walker, Michael Johnson and David Wexler forms the foundation of the course. In the first document, intimate partner violence is defined, described and quantified. The next three documents follow the progress of theories of domestic violence from the more traditional to the more contemporary ways of understanding this complex phenomenon. Perspectives on the mechanism and impacts of verbal violence are reviewed in the following two articles. The next article is a brief assessment tool commonly utilized to identify and evaluate domestic violence. Following this, two documents are provided which describe and quantify the phenomenon of intimate partner violence in ethnically diverse cultures. Particular attention is paid to the effects of patriarchy and religion on the development and maintenance of domestic violence. The next document presents information about the incidence and scope of intimate partner violence in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender population. This is followed by a document which identifies the sections of the ethics codes and laws which pertain to the clinician’s role in the identification, assessment, and response to intimate partner violence. An audiotaped interview with Meredith Watkins provides a brief summary of changes in the DSM-5 which affect the identification of domestic violence. Transcripts are available for all videos & audios. Additional resources and references are provided for further study, but they are not part of the course.