Mexican Institute of Petroleum

About: Mexican Institute of Petroleum is a government organization based out in Mexico City, Mexico. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Catalysis & Asphaltene. The organization has 3273 authors who have published 4170 publications receiving 87269 citations.

¿Violencia episódica o terrorismo íntimo? Una propuesta exploratoria para clasificar la violencia contra la mujer en las relaciones de pareja

Abstract: SUMMARYIntroductionThe concern of this paper comes from a reflection on the phenomenonof violence against women in the context of intimate couplerelationships. Even though studies dealing with the issue tend to focuson the presence of physical violence, it should not be forgotten thatin the same relationships several types of emotional and sometimessexual violence may co-exist. Violent men intentionally aim to createa threatening climate against women. To do so, they resort todevaluations, insults, threats, maltreatment, shouting, contempt,intolerance, humiliations, jealousy and accusations. Nevertheless,women are often unaware of many of them given the social tolerancetowards overall abuse and the lack of institutional alternatives.There are, however, some difficulties to operationalize thesebehaviours. It is particularly difficult to measure the characteristicpattern followed by these relationships as this may involve very subtleforms of violence. Likewise, results obtained in the physical andpsychological dimensions are usually kept as separate areas or theyare presented at best in a mixed form to show the prevalences fromthe different surveys carried out.This article is a theoretical and statistical exercise aimed atconstructing a typology of male violence against women. Its startingpoint is a proposal posing that in heterosexual relationships two typesof violence are present. The first one may be called episodic violence,where one or both members of the couple carry out some violent actwithout the desire to control or dominate the other partner. In theother one, defined as intimate terrorism, the man acts out with theclear purpose of exerting both a violent and non-violent control anddominion over the woman’s actions, thoughts, and emotions.Although it is certainly arguable, it might be interesting to analyzethis classification for it is risky to suppose that there are couplerelationships where a symmetry in the use of violence exists both onthe part of men and women —that is, that women are as violent asmen. It is risky because it distorts violence’s gender nature bypresupposing that the same behaviour may be exerted with the samephysical and symbolic strength and that it will have similarconsequences. However, we think it is worth taking it into account asa starting point for this analysis.To do so, a database derived from a study conducted amonga sample of women attending general medical consultation wasused. The main analysis axis was the indicator of having experienceda physically violent behaviour on the part of the partner during thelast year. This was related to five emotional violence dimensionswhich represent different modalities as to their intentionality andimpact. The groups thus formed were analyzed considering somevariables which were previously regarded as associated to this formof violence, including demographic features, and some otherfeatures related to household income participation and thedistribution of household keeping chores in the women’s families.Specific features regarding the violent relationship, such as themotives behind the physical violence episodes and the role playedby alcohol abuse on the part of the male partner in these episodes,were also considered.MethodA database derived from a transversal ex post facto study conductedwith a 345-women sample attending first-time or subsequent medicalattention in a first level institution was analyzed.A structured questionnaire made up of different areas wasapplied. The following areas were included in this study: 1. Socio-demographic variables from each woman, her male partner andher family. 2. A violence severity scale containing 22 different typesof physically violent behaviours from men against women, and 36emotional violence types. A previous analysis of the latter showedfive conceptually congruous dimensions: Devaluation, Threateningbehaviours, Intimidation, Hostility, and Abusive expectations. 3.Features of both the relationship and the violent episodes. 4. Alcoholabuse on the part of the partner.To construct the typology, women who had experienced at leastone physical violence attack by their partners during the last twelvemonths were classified, regardless of the frequency and severity ofsuch behaviour. With this sub -sample, a multidimensional escalationanalysis was performed with the five emotional violence dimensionsreported and these were considered as «stimuli».Decisions were then taken as to the configuration obtained andthe women were classified in three groups considering both thepresence and severity of the physical violence experienced and thefrequency of the different forms of emotional violence. Based on thesegroups classification, variance and chi square analysis were carriedout with the variables selected to observe whether these effectivelydifferentiated the women from each group.