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This qualitative study sought to explore the shared risk factors and social norms that may underpin the co-occurrence of intimate partner violence, child maltreatment, and violence against other marginalized household members in the home. Data are drawn from participants who completed either in-depth interviews (N = 51 men, N = 52 women participants) or focus groups (N = 22 men, N = 23 women participants) and were living in two distinct humanitarian settings: North Kivu, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Northern Shan State and Southern Kachin State, Myanmar. Within this overarching objective, attention to these shared drivers for violence in the home, which may arise from people having multiple and interacting social identities, such as disability status, gender, and age, was explored through an inclusion lens and inductive coding approaches. Findings point to risk factors of violence in the home at all levels of the ecological model, which are underpinned at the macro level by gender inequality, armed conflict, and political instability, among other factors. With the community and family levels, gender inequality manifested in norms related to the acceptability of violence, family reputation, and aged and gendered power hierarchies within the home. Shared risk factors of violence at these levels also included displacement/migration-related stressors, inconsistent income, and lack of community resources to support families, especially for those with disabilities. At the most time-proximal level, interactions between role (non)fulfillment, inability of families to meet their basic needs, alcohol and substance abuse, and abusive expressions of anger were found to catalyze instances of violence in the home. The conceptual model also illuminates potential levers and inclusive entry points that prevent violence in the home for diverse women, children, persons with disabilities, and older persons. Key attention to addressing gender inequality and acceptance of violence must be a cornerstone of sustainable programming, alongside complementary approaches that address other shared risk factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To assess the association between lifetime violence victimization and self-reported symptoms associated with pregnancy complications among women living in refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border. Cross-sectional survey of partnered women aged 15-49 years living in three refugee camps who reported a pregnancy that resulted in a live birth within the past 2 years with complete data (n = 337). Variables included the lifetime prevalence of any violence victimization, conflict victimization, intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization, self-reported symptoms of pregnancy complications, and demographic covariates. Logistic generalized estimating equations, accounting for camp-level clustering, were used to assess the relationships of interest. Approximately one in six women (16.0 %) reported symptoms related to pregnancy complications for their most recent birth within the last 2 years and 15 % experienced violence victimization. In multivariable analyses, any form of lifetime violence victimization was associated with 3.1 times heightened odds of reporting symptoms (95 % CI 1.8-5.2). In the final adjusted model, conflict victimization was associated with a 3.0 increase in odds of symptoms (95 % CI 2.4-3.7). However, lifetime IPV victimization was not associated with symptoms, after accounting for conflict victimization (aOR: 1.8; 95 % CI 0.4-9.0). Conflict victimization was strongly linked with heightened risk of self-reported symptoms associated with pregnancy complications among women in refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border. Future research and programs should consider the long-term impacts of conflict victimization in relation to maternal health to better meet the needs of refugee women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Objective: To document the prevalence and characteristics of conflict victimization and its associations with past-year intimate partner violence (IPV) among refugee women affected by the protracted conflict in Burma (Myanmar). Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 861 women living in 3 refugee camps along the Thai–Burma border from February to April 2008. Descriptive statistics were generated regarding experiences of conflict victimization and generalized estimating equations were used to determine the odds of reporting past-year IPV. Results: In all, 9.6% of partnered women reported conflict victimization and 7.9% of women reported experiencing past-year IPV. After accounting for demographic variables, women who experienced conflict victimization were 5.9 times more likely to report past-year IPV than women who had not experienced conflict victimization (95% confidence interval, 5.0–6.9). Conclusion: Given the strong association uncovered in the present study, interventions to reduce the negative effects of conflict victimization should incorporate other forms of violence prevention, including IPV. Future longitudinal research is needed to discern pathways through which these experiences are related. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Refugee women may experience multiple forms of victimization. The hypotheses underlying the present analyses were that experiences of victimization during conflict and intimate partner violence (IPV) would be associated with heightened odds of suicide ideation among refugee women living in 3 camps along the Thai-Burma border. Descriptive statistics were generated to describe the prevalence of conflict victimization, past-year IPV victimization, past-month suicide ideation, and covariates among partnered women with complete data (N = 848) from a cross-sectional survey conducted in early 2008. Logistic generalized estimating equations were used to assess the crude and adjusted relationships between variables. The mean age of women was 32.12 years, 91.0% were married, and 78.8% were of Karen ethnicity. Overall, 7.4% of women reported past-month suicide ideation. Of those women who did not experience any victimization or conflict victimization only, 5.1% and 5.2% reported suicide ideation, respectively. By contrast 26.7% of women who experienced only IPV victimization reported suicide ideation, and 50.0% of women who experienced both forms of victimization reported suicide ideation. Understanding each form of violence victimization and their relationships to suicide ideation may be important for targeting psychosocial services and violence prevention programs within protracted refugee settings., (Copyright © 2013 International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies.)