Impact of Intimate Partner Violence on Parenting and Children's Externalizing Behaviors: Transactional Processes Over Time

Qualitative study exploring parenting among mothers and female caregivers living with the IPV, mental health and HIV syndemic in South Africa

BACKGROUND

In South Africa, women disproportionately bear the burden of intimate partner violence (IPV), HIV or AIDS, and poor mental health.

OBJECTIVE

This study investigated parenting practices among women affected by IPV, HIV and poor mental health syndemics.

STUDY SETTING

The study was conducted in two sites, a peri-urban area and a rural area in Mpumalanga, South Africa.

STUDY DESIGN

A qualitative research design using a narrative approach with in-depth interviews supported by arts-based methods was used. Data were analysed thematically using MAXQDA (2022).

PARTICIPANTS

20 women aged 20-60 who screened positive for HIV, IPV and/or poor mental health in a larger three-generational cohort study were selected.

RESULTS

Living with the syndemics exacerbated socioeconomic challenges that often translated into an inability to meet basic child needs. Socioeconomic challenges also led to more harsh parenting practices among women living with IPV-Mental Health and HIV-Mental Health syndemics. Due to lack of trust from family members, women living with the HIV-Mental Health-IPV syndemic were often separated from their children. These women exhibited less harsh parenting practices than the women in the other syndemic groups when they did see their children. A history of childhood trauma, leading to overprotective parenting, was common across the groups except for the IPV-Mental Health group. Women in the IPV-Mental Health group often had strained relations with their children's fathers, affecting their engagement and connection with their children.

CONCLUSION

The study underlines challenges experienced by women with IPV-Mental Health, HIV-Mental Health and HIV-Mental Health-IPV syndemics. The overlap of these epidemics strains women's relationships and affects women's parenting practices detrimentally resulting in an inadequate provision for children's needs.

Testing the Spillover Effect of Intimate Partner Violence Victimization on Emotionally Abusive and Harsh Parenting Practices: The Application of Propensity Score Matching

Prior research reported a significant association between intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization and negative parenting, but there was an overreliance on U.S. samples and families from low socioeconomic status backgrounds. Therefore, this quasi-experimental study examined the association between recent IPV victimization and abusive parenting practices in a sample of community-based women from Poland. Participants were mothers of children aged 2 to 5 years (N = 610) attending an outpatient clinic located in a city in south-eastern Poland. Mothers were asked about their IPV experiences in the past 12 months and were classed as either IPV positive or IPV negative. Outcome measures assessed emotionally abusive and harsh parenting practices. All data were collected online. To reduce bias in background characteristics (i.e., age, education, employment status, financial distress, self-esteem, childhood violence history, alcohol problems, current mental distress, social support, exposure to COVID-19-pandemic-related stressors, and child sex), we applied the propensity score matching (PSM) technique. Group differences before and after matching were examined using independent samples t-tests. Prematching analyses revealed that IPV-positive mothers used significantly more emotionally abusive and harsh parenting practices than IPV-negative mothers. However, the two samples differed substantially on six background characteristics which are known risk factors for IPV and child maltreatment (financial distress, self-esteem, childhood violence history, current mental distress, social support, and exposure to COVID-19-pandemic-related stressors). PSM was successful in reducing those imbalances. Postmatching group comparisons were statistically nonsignificant for emotionally abusive and harsh parenting, disproving the spillover hypothesis. We conclude that IPV victimization is not related to emotionally abusive and harsh parenting practices when controlling for confounding variables.

Cognitive Behavior Therapy by Nurses in Reducing Symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder on Children as Victims of Violence: A Scoping Review

Violence against children can cause psychological problems such as post-traumatic syndrome disorder (PTSD). The negative impact of violence on children is psychological and physical problems and risk of suicide. Nurses have a role to provide comprehensive nursing care such as cognitive behavior therapy for reducing PTSD symptoms. The purpose of this study was to describe the methods of cognitive behavior therapy to reduce symptoms of PTSD in children who are victims of violence. This study used the scoping review method. The databases use for the literature review in this study were CINAHL, PubMed, and Scopus. The keywords used in English were "cognitive behavioral therapy OR CBT" AND "violence OR abuse" AND "post-traumatic stress disorder OR PTSD" AND "child OR children". The inclusion criteria were full text, randomized control trial or quasi-experimental research design, English language, the sample was children, and the publication period was for the last 10 years (2013-2022). We found 10 articles discussing CBT intervention on children who experienced victim abuse to reduce symptoms of PTSD. Most of the articles in this study used randomized control trial design. Several samples in this study are from the USA. The total sample was 47-320 respondents. This study showed three methods of CBT, namely psychoeducation, self-management, and coping strategies. CBT interventions can be carried out face-to-face or online. The activities carried out by the participants were relaxing, participating in training, counseling, problem-solving discussions, and therapy to improve sleep quality. Cognitive behavioral therapy is an intervention that can be carried out to reduce the traumatic impact on child victims of violence by taking into account the characteristics and development of the children.

Intimate Partner Violence and Children: Essentials for the Pediatric Nurse Practitioner

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a public health problem of epidemic proportions. IPV often starts early in adolescence and continues throughout an individual's lifespan. IPV is defined as abuse or aggression occurring in the context of a romantic relationship that is perpetrated by a current or former partner. IPV victims often experience severe psychological trauma, physical injury, and even death. The direct recipient of the violence is often not the only individual impacted. Children are often peripheral victims of IPV. It is vital that pediatric health care providers, including pediatric nurse practitioners, recognize that IPV is indeed a pediatric health care crisis requiring strategies for both identification and intervention. This continuing education article will discuss IPV and its impact on children from conception to adolescence while exploring implications for practice.

Intergenerational Transmission of Effects of Women's Stressors During Pregnancy: Child Psychopathology and the Protective Role of Parenting

Objective

Experiences of stress and adversity, such as intimate partner violence, confer risk for psychiatric problems across the life span. The effects of these risks are disproportionately borne by women and their offspring-particularly those from communities of color. The prenatal period is an especially vulnerable period of fetal development, during which time women's experiences of stress can have long-lasting implications for offspring mental health. Importantly, there is a lack of focus on women's capacity for resilience and potential postnatal protective factors that might mitigate these intergenerational risks and inform intervention efforts. The present study examined intergenerational associations between women's prenatal stressors and child executive functioning and externalizing problems, testing maternal parenting quality and child sex as moderators, using a large, prospective, sociodemographically diverse cohort.

Methods

We used data from 1,034 mother-child dyads (64% Black, 30% White) from the Conditions Affecting Neurocognitive Development and Learning in Early Childhood (CANDLE) pregnancy cohort within the ECHO PATHWAYS consortium. Women's prenatal stressors included stressful life events (pSLE) and intimate partner violence (pIPV). Measures of child psychopathology at age 4-6 included executive functioning and externalizing problems. Parenting behaviors were assessed by trained observers, averaged across two sessions of mother-child interactions. Linear regression models were used to estimate associations between women's prenatal stressors and child psychopathology, adjusting for confounders and assessing moderation effects by maternal parenting quality and child sex.

Results

Women's exposures to pSLE and pIPV were independently associated with child executive functioning problems and externalizing problems in fully-adjusted models. Maternal parenting quality moderated associations between pSLE and both outcomes, such that higher parenting quality was protective for the associations between women's pSLE and child executive functioning and externalizing problems. No moderation by child sex was found.

Discussion

Findings from this large, sociodemographically diverse cohort suggest women's exposures to interpersonal violence and major stressful events-common for women during pregnancy-may prenatally program her child's executive functioning and externalizing problems. Women's capacity to provide high quality parenting can buffer this intergenerational risk. Implications for universal and targeted prevention and early intervention efforts to support women's and children's wellbeing are discussed.