Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Aug;10(8):2845-2852.
doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_2313_20. Epub 2021 Aug 27.

Prevalence of spousal violence among married women in a rural area in North Kerala

Affiliations

Prevalence of spousal violence among married women in a rural area in North Kerala

Jesha Mohammedali Mundodan et al. J Family Med Prim Care. 2021 Aug.

Abstract

Background: Domestic violence has substantial public health consequences. More than one-third of women globally suffer from physical and sexual violence, mostly by an intimate partner with a lifetime prevalence of 10%-69%. In India, 28.8% of the ever-married women in the reproductive age group, reported domestic violence. Although Kerala, in southern India, performs better than other Indian states on a host of human development indicators for women, 15.8% among the women in this group have ever experienced physical or sexual violence in the past 12 months, the most common perpetrator being the husband.

Methodology: A community-based cross-sectional study was carried out among the ever-married women, residing in a selected area of northern Kerala, who have been married for at least 1 year. One to one structured interview was conducted with a pretested structured questionnaire by the investigator. Spousal violence was defined as proportion of ever-married women with a lifetime experience of violence perpetrated by their spouse, manifested through acts of physical, sexual, and/or emotional violence, even threat.

Results: A total of 290 women were interviewed. The age of the participants ranged from 18 years to 64 years; majority were Muslims. Only 16.5% were college-educated and over 90% were homemakers. 29% reported having experienced spousal violence; with the most common being emotional violence (19%) closely followed by sexual violence (18.6%) and physical violence (14.8%). A little over one-third (39.7%) reported controlling behaviour of their husband. Age of the participant (P = 0.019), absence of social support (P = 0.034), employment status of husband (P = 0.026), controlling behaviour of husband (P < 0.001), alcohol abuse by husband (P = 0.004) and extra-marital relationship of spouse (P < 0.001) were found to have significant influence on spousal violence experience.

Conclusion: More than a quarter of the married women in this rural setting have experienced one or the other form of violence.

Recommendation: A multifaceted approach needs to be employed which takes into consideration legal measures, social sciences, women empowerment, mental health systems and educate the men to curb this menace.

Keywords: Domestic violence; emotional violence; ever-married women; physical violence; sexual violence; spousal violence.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

There are no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Distribution of different types of Domestic violence

References

    1. World Health Organisation. Global and Regional Estimates of violence against women. Available from: http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/publications/violence/978924156462...
    1. Pandey MK, Singh P, Yadav RA. Domestic Violence and Women's Health in India: Evidence from Health Survey. Germany: University Library of Munich; 2008.
    1. International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS). National Family Health Survey IV (2015-2016), India. Factsheets. 2018. Available from: http://rchiips.org/nfhs/factsheet_NFHS-4.shtml .
    1. UN Women. Facts and figures: Ending violence against women and girls. Available from: https://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/ending-violence-against-women/fact... .
    1. Sakhi Women's Resource Center. “Gender and Decentralized Planning, Kerala, India, Trivandrum. 2004