Citation

Bell M, Goodman L, Dutton MA. J. Fam. Violence 2007; 22(6): 413-428.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2007, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10896-007-9096-9

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Much of the discourse on intimate partner violence assumes that women must end their relationship with their abusive partner to increase their safety and emotional well-being. Few studies, however, exist to support this assumption. Equally problematic, those studies that do exist have failed to distinguish women who leave and stay out from those who leave only to later return. Comparing emotional well-being and experiences of violence for 206 low-income, primarily Black battered women following different relationship trajectories, this longitudinal study found that women both separated from and together with their partner for the entire year of the study fared best at the end of that year compared to women in and out of the relationship over time. Beyond challenging common assumptions, these findings highlight the importance of considering the larger context within which an individual instance of leaving occurs.