Public Helping Reactions to Intimate Partner Violence against Women in European Countries: The Role of Gender-Related Individual and Macrosocial Factors

Abstract

Public helping reactions are essential to reduce a victim’s secondary victimization in intimate partner violence against women (IPVAW) cases. Because gender-related characteristics have been linked widely to IPVAW prevalence, the study aimed to examine individual attitudes and perceptions toward different forms of violence against women, as well as gender-related macrosocial ideological and structural factors, in explaining helping reactions to IPVAW across 28 European countries. We performed multilevel logistic regression analysis, taking measures from the Eurobarometer 2016 (N = 7115) and the European Institute for Gender Equality datasets. Our study revealed a greater individual perceived IPVAW prevalence, positive perception about the appropriateness of a legal response to psychological and sexual violence against women partners, and less VAW-supportive attitudes predicted helping reactions (i.e., formal, informal), but not negative reactions to IPVAW. Moreover, individuals from European countries with a greater perceived IPVAW prevalence and gender equality preferred formal reactions to IPVAW. Otherwise, in the European countries with lesser perceived IPVAW prevalence and negative perceptions about the appropriate legal response to psychological and sexual violence, people were more likely to provide informal reactions to IPVAW. Our results showed the role of gender-related characteristics influenced real reactions toward known victim of IPVAW.

None of My Business? An Experiment Analyzing Willingness to Formally Report Incidents of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women

“…Regarding the correlates influencing the willingness to report IPVAW episodes to the authorities, the results show that variables related to the episodes of violence, and respondents’ personal factors, are both associated with the propensity to report incidents of IPVAW. These findings provide support to our hypothesis and are consistent with previous research ( Felson & Feld, 2009 ; Pagliaro et al, 2020 ; Serrano-Montilla et al, 2020 ). However, the situational characteristics of the episode of violence had a limited effect on willingness to report the abuse in the current study.…”

“…Most studies show that respondents prefer mediating responses than reporting ones ( Branch et al, 2013 ; Gracia et al, 2009 ; Serrano-Montilla et al, 2020 ). As Gracia et al (2009) pointed out, this preference could indicate that a response such as reporting to the police is probably viewed as a last resource, only to be used for extreme cases of IPVAW, while other instances that are not considered as such would deserve mediative responses.…”

“…Regarding gender, most of the studies show that women are more willing to report the IPVAW scenarios when compared with men ( Beeble et al, 2008 ; Gracia et al, 2009 ; Serrano-Montilla et al, 2020 ). However, these findings are not entirely consistent, and other studies have found that men are actually more willing to help victims than women are ( Eagly & Crowley, 1986 ), or that gender is not a determining factor in the tendency to intervene in response to IPVAW episodes ( Cinquegrana et al, 2018 ; Owarish-Gross, 2012 ).…”

“…In terms of social perceptions, previous research shows that the perceived frequency of IPVAW is positively related to willingness to intervene ( Alfredsson et al, 2014 ; Beeble et al, 2008 ). For instance, Serrano-Montilla et al (2020) found that, in countries with greater perceived IPVAW prevalence, individuals were more likely to engage in formal helping behaviors compared with those in countries with lesser perceived prevalence. Along similar lines, research shows a negative correlation between tolerance toward IPVAW and willingness to intervene.…”

Attitudes towards Violence in Adolescents and Youth Intimate Partner Relationships: Validation of the Spanish Version of the EAV

“…This type of violence, involving an actual or former partner, is at this time the more prevalent way of violence affecting women, being a major public health problem. This situation is affecting women, and has become a major cause of social disengagement, economy burden, and mental health problems, including depression, substance abuse, or trauma [ 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ]. Thus, nowadays, it is possible to talk of a global epidemic of violence against women, with a total life prevalence in the world of one third of women that have experience some type of violence related to a romantic relationship [ 16 , 17 , 18 ].…”