The study examined the extent of wife-beating acceptance and factors that influence women's attitude towards wife-beating in Ethiopia from a nationally representative sample of 11,658 participants in the 2011 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey. Multivariate logistic regressions were fitted to investigate the relationships between women's attitude towards wife-beating and women's decision-making autonomy after controlling for socio-demographic factors. The majority (56%) of women agreed that wife-beating is justified when wife neglects children, 53% when wife burns the food, 50% when wife argues with husband, 48% when wife goes out without telling husband, and nearly 45% when wife refuses to have sex with husband. Overall, 51% of women had shown highly favorable attitude towards wife-beating. Women's place of residence, household wealth quintiles, educational levels, marital status, and husband/partner's employment status have shown significant association with women's attitude towards wife-beating. Women's decision-making autonomy was also a significant predictor of women's attitude towards wife-beating. The odds of having highly favorable attitude towards wife-beating deceased significantly as the level of decision-making autonomy of women improved. Given the widespread acceptance of wife-beating among Ethiopian women, social policies that empower women could serve as a positive force in changing attitudes towards wife-beating and violence against women.

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Women’s household decision-making, a reflection of interpersonal power dynamics in intimate relationships is assumed to play a central role in eliminating violence against women. Thus we sought to examine the association between women’s household decision-making autonomy and the occurrence of intimate partner violence (IPV) among Ethiopian women. We used data gathered in the 2016 Ethiopia Demographic and Health Survey (EDHS-2016). We limited our study to ever-married women (aged: 15 - 49 years) who responded to the domestic violence questions (n = 4,469). Sampling weights were applied and effects associated with complex survey design were accounted for. Overall, 24%, 23.1%, and 10.1% of women have experienced emotional abuse, physical violence, or sexual violence, respectively in their lifetimes. The relationship between demographic variables and IPV were inconsistent and mostly non-significant. We found significant association between decision-making autonomy and IPV variables. Women who made decisions jointly with their husbands/partners had lower risk of domestic violence as compared to women with low level of household decision-making autonomy. No significant difference between women in the low and high level of decision-making groups. Egalitarian family power structures may be beneficial toward reducing IPV and achieving gender equality in Ethiopia.

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Results of the study may suggest that public health intervention strategies targeting condom use among immigrants should incorporate programs that improve English language training tailored to the cultural practices and values of the immigrants, and consider the effect of acculturation on condom use.