How Do Men in Treatment for Intimate Partner Violence Experience Parenting their Young Child? A Descriptive Phenomenological Analysis

Abstract

Men who use intimate partner violence (IPV) often have challenges as caregivers such as poor understanding of children's needs and emotions. There is little knowledge regarding their everyday-life experiences of being a parent. We interviewed 14 men in therapy for intimate partner violence on how they experienced their relationship to one of their children (mean age 4,5 years). We performed a descriptive phenomenological analysis. Informants seldom explored their children's experience. They found that their fathering was influenced by past relationships and negative expectations for the future. The informants' bodily experience of emotional arousal was described as difficult to control and understand and was a limited source for meaning making in the fatherchild relationship. The experience of being a good father was connected to presence and control of the child's behavior. Informants felt that what they experienced as good parenting lacked others' recognition. Interventions for partner-abusive men should address their fathering and focus on fathers' life-experience and context as influencing their fathering. Therapeutic interventions should strengthen partner-abusive fathers' awareness of and meaning making from their emotional arousal. Where safety permits, dyadic interventions aiming at re-establishing the child's experience of safety in the father-child relationship should be considered by therapy providers as a complement to established interventions with partner-abusive men.

Breaking the cycle of intergenerational abuse: A qualitative interview study of men participating in a perinatal program to reduce violence

“…These differences may be because the fathers in this sample were still in the first two postnatal years, and, therefore, many of their descriptions involve idealized views of how they hope to be involved and may or may not reflect how they go on to parent as their children get older. Indeed, the tension between the idealized view in the early years and the reality of fatherhood as children get older is noted in other research with fathers who are violent (Mohaupt et al, 2019;Perel & Peled, 2008).…”

“…Moreover, fathers who are violent have been shown to be less sensitive and responsive to their children's needs, to show less affection, and to perceive their children more negatively (Holt, 2015; Stewart & Scott, 2014). This may be especially the case for fathers of infants and young children as they start to show increased autonomy, which can be perceived by fathers as negative and problematic (Mohaupt, Duckert, & Askeland, 2019).…”

I skyggen av likestillingen – voldsutsatte mødre i Norge

“…Før de ikke bør ha noe med den personen å gjøre. Hvor mye tåler barn?» Denne bekymringen er ikke er ubegrunnet i lys av forskning på voldsutøvende menns foreldreskap, som finner at det er kjennetegnet av dysfunksjonell og ska-delig foreldreatferd som fiendtlighet, sinne, urimelige krav og overreagering, hardhendthet (fysisk vold) og en kontrollerende og autoritaer vaeremåte (Bancroft et al, 2012;Katz et al, 2020;Mohaupt et al, 2019;Thompson-Walsh et al, 2021) eller motsatt; ekstremt tillatende, uengasjert og uansvarlig (Heward-Belle, 2016). Samlet finner forskningen på voldsutøvende menn at deres foreldrepraksiser står i sterk kontrast til rådende normer om foreldreskap og etablert kunnskap om konsekvenser av vold i oppveksten.…”

“…161 L ( -2016; BLD, 2018). Fedre -også de som har utøvd vold mot partner -har vanligvis foreldreansvar og kontakt med barna etter samlivsbrudd (Mohaupt et al, 2019). Det medfører at en voldsutsatt mor må samarbeide og tilrettelegge for barnas kontakt med en mann som har utøvd vold mot henne.…”

Partner-violent and non-violent fathers’ descriptions of co-parenting

“…Children are affected by male-to-female IPV in the home directly as they are at high risk of physical child abuse (Finkelhor et al, 2009), and indirectly through reduced maternal care (Levendovsky et al, 2018). Men who use IPV tend to have shortcomings as caregivers, as they often exhibit negative, shallow and inflexible mental representations of children's intentions and feelings (Francis and Wolfe, 2007;Stover and Kiselica, 2014;Mohupt et al, 2020) and poor modelling of affect regulation and poor regulation of children's affect (Maliken and Katz, 2013;Mohaupt et al, 2020). Similarly, it has been theorised (Fonagy, 1999) and demonstrated (Covell et al, 2007) that men who use IPV, often have problems with empathically relating to their partner.…”