Multi-day Patterns around Taking Action in Intimate Partner Violence

This study was to determine the multi-day relationships among stressors, need and taking action (seeking counseling, taking legal action, leaving) by women in violent relationships. Women with recent husband-to-wife abuse but not at high-risk for life-threatening violence were recruited from six primary care clinics and asked to complete a daily description of the previous day's violence, need-for-action, and stressors using Interactive Voice Response via telephone for 8 weeks. Taking action (seeking counseling, taking legal action, leaving) was determined via weekly telephone contacts. To identify day-to-day recurrent strings, we used orbital decomposition, limiting time series to 29 women who took action during the study. Multi-day patterns were not common in taking action and are unrelated to violence. Only one 5-day string involving seeking counseling was identified in which women felt a lack of control. While taking legal action was part of five 5-days strings, each string consisted of one day of taking legal action within four days of no need-for-action, violence or stalking. Finally, one 4-day string that began with leaving coupled with spouse's excessive alcohol intake but no violence was noted. Hence, decisions to take action in violent relationships are not typically multi-day decisions linked to violence, but rather sudden events triggered by loss of control, his alcohol intake or unique situational factors.