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Research on barriers that exist for male victims/survivors of sexual abuse in relation to disclosing their experiences is limited. This article shares qualitative data in relation to disclosure and help-seeking barriers encountered by male victims/survivors of female-perpetrated sexual abuse. Findings from semi-structured interviews conducted with 30 male victims/survivors in the United Kingdom about their forced-to-penetrate (FTP) experiences are discussed. FTP cases involve a man being FTP, with his penis and without his consent, the vagina, anus, or mouth of a woman. During their interviews, male victims/survivors shared multiple barriers which resulted in delayed, selective, limited, or no disclosure. These included; masculinity, feelings of shame and self-blame, struggling to understand and label experiences, concerns about the consequences of disclosure, and a lack of (knowledge about) support. These barriers are critically discussed and positioned within their broader contexts and consideration is given to how they can be overcome by those most likely to engage with male FTP victims/survivors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coercive control has been shown to be far more damaging for victims psychologically than physical violence. Linked to this, domestic violence perpetrators are increasingly turning to the online world to enact control and abuse. Women are most likely to be killed once they have separated from their abusers, and perpetrators harness the online realm to continue the abuse long after a relationship has ended, with devastating consequences. This article draws on a subsection of data from a qualitative study as it relates to survivor accounts of online and technological abuse (via social media, mobile phones, Global Positioning Systems [GPS] tracking, etc.) as it is enacted by cisgender men against cisgender women. We reveal crucial evidence of the ways in which intimate partner abuse via the technological realm serves to exacerbate harm and prevent victims from fully recovering from their trauma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intimate partner violence causes significant, long-lasting harm to almost one-third (27%) of the world's population of women. Even when women leave abusive relationships, some men continue to exercise control over their ex-partners through psychological control, threats, violence, stalking, and other forms of harassment. In this qualitative study, 52 purposively sampled women who self-identified as victims or survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) from male partners were interviewed. Data were analyzed with a theoretically informed thematic analysis, supported by Nvivo® software. We found that leaving a violent relationship was a long-term process fraught with difficulty and ongoing risks of psychological harm. The concept of Continuous Traumatic Stress (CTS), first developed to understand the impact of state-sponsored violence and war, was found to be a particularly useful tool for the analysis of the impact of post-separation abuse. Additionally, CTS encourages researchers and practitioners to think anew about resilience-centered approaches to improving protection and access to justice for female victims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is well known that victims of intimate partner violence experience numerous barriers to leaving abusive relationships. For ethnic minority and immigrant women these barriers are significantly exacerbated. This metasynthesis explored barriers to help-seeking as experienced by Black, Asian, minority ethnic and immigrant women with experience of intimate partner violence. A review of worldwide literature published in English in peer-reviewed journals on this topic from 2000 to July 2020 produced 2597 relevant articles. After removing duplicates and applying the exclusion criteria, a total of 47 articles were selected for inclusion in the review. The synthesis found that these women faced additional barriers as a result of institutional racism, immigration laws, culture and religion, and issues of cultural competence, and lack of diversity within frontline services. Such barriers, from a range of formal and informal resources, services and other mechanisms of support, served to exacerbate feelings of fear, threat, isolation and powerlessness. The barriers were also further weaponised by perpetrators in order to extend their reign of terror and control. As a result, women were caught in a double-bind – stay in an abusive relationship or face further threats and consequences if they attempted to leave. Whilst our search criteria focused on barriers to help-seeking, many of the papers included in our synthesis also explored facilitators to help-seeking, which are included in our findings and overwhelmingly relate to informal support from females. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing research explores ethical and methodological considerations associated with interviewing men, including male survivors of domestic abuse, and interviewing female survivors of domestic and sexual abuse. However, there is no comparable body of research that specifically considers interviewing male survivors of sexual violence and abuse. Reflecting upon our experiences of interviewing 32 male survivors of female-perpetrated sexual violence, we critically discuss four key ethical and methodological issues that arose; the challenges around recruiting male survivor participants; the interview process; the impacts of gender dynamics between interviewers and participants; and the importance of research to participants. Based on our reflections we make a number of recommendations for scholars who are conducting future research with male survivors of sexual violence and abuse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]