Domestic violence (DV) is a global issue that can affect anyone regardless of what role they play in a family household. It does not discriminate by education, age, religion, etc. DV includes any type of violence or abuse that occurs within a domestic setting. For the purposes of this study, this content primarily focuses on intimate partner violence (IPV) as the main form of DV and is used interchangeably throughout the text. This study examines the influence of population density on arrest rates for DV and some factors behind the likelihood of arrests in urban and rural areas. The literature between both of these societies has demonstrated a clear difference in social behaviors that shape the response to DV (Websdale and Johnson 1998). Normative social influence theory suggests that people's influence may lead someone to conform in order to be liked or accepted by a group (Izuma 2017). This theory hypothesizes that the proportion of people living in rural per county will have fewer arrests for DV than the proportion of people living in non-rural areas because of the need for positive relationships that can lead to conformity (Izuma 2017). Furthermore, it is predicted that there are less arrests in rural areas because of the effects of informal social controls in these areas. Informal social controls can take place between police and citizens that may interact more personally through socialization. An example is when citizens take matters into their own hands, therefore prolonging the reporting of crimes to police. This study uses secondary data provided by sources such as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) website and Social Explorer. Broader implications of this research are that it could shed some light on the social dynamics that impact the outcome of crime in both densely populated and sparsely populated areas.

Background: National studies have previously found that those within the disabled population are underserved in regard to healthcare, education, employment and medical access. Historically, the majority of those who are disabled due to this engrained inequality receive government assistance. Multiple laws have been enacted to protect those who fall into this minority such as ADA, section 504 and IDEA. These laws ensure the disabled equal access to employment, public services, education, public accommodations and telecommunications. Federally funded departments called student disability services (SDS) are on college/university campuses to ensure equal access and treatment throughout a student's college career. Under the SDS department, students can request accommodations, advocacy, and support throughout their 4- year degree. The purpose of this study is to explore whether student's who utilize the SDS department at the University of Central Florida are earning equivalent or higher GPA percentages in comparison to student's who do not utilize services from the department. Method: I worked along with the SDS department on the University of Central Florida's campus to gather data on current students being assisted by the department without any identifying information from the spring 2018 term. The sample total was 2,569 students who were active with the SDS department. In order to assess this question, an OLS regression analysis will be run to regress each of the variables: ethnicity, sex, diagnosis and academic classification.

Using data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, I applied Phelan, Link and Tehranifar's (2010) fundamental cause theory (FCT) framework to examine the association between socioeconomic status (SES) and prescription opioid use behaviors. I also explored the mediating roles of health status and the deployment of flexible resources. I hypothesized that (1) a negative association would exist between SES and prescription opioid use, misuse, and use disorder, and (2) health status and the deployment of flexible resources (e.g. health care access, knowledge, social support) would mediate this relationship. As hypothesized and consistent with FCT, higher SES was associated with significantly lower odds of prescription opioid use behaviors. Two flexible resources, health care access and social support, and various indicators of poor health helped explain this relationship. Inconsistent with FCT, knowledge of heroin use as being a "great risk" was not a mediator of the SES-prescription opioid use behaviors association. Based on these findings, efforts to reduce SES disparities in prescription opioid use behaviors should emphasize reducing SES disparities overall as well as in health and access to important health-enhancing resources. Limitations of this study and directions for future research are discussed.

This 2 x 3 factorial study focuses on roles of different rejection types (instigating force) and lack of self-regulation (weak inhibiting force) on the commission of obsessive relational intrusion (ORI). Rejection was manipulated through vignettes depicting no rejection or one of two types of romantic rejection: an explicit rejection (rejection that makes an internal attribution to the rejected as cause of relationship ending) or a passive rejection that “lets the pursuer down easy” (external attributions for relationship demise). Self-regulation was manipulated through a thought suppression exercise (2 conditions: free writing/no suppression vs. restricted writing/thought suppression). After scenario and writing exercise, participants (N = 221) rated their likelihood of thinking or engaging in ORI. A main effect of rejection and an interaction between rejection and self-regulation were observed. Participants explicitly rejected reported higher scores for aggressive acts compared to participants passively rejected. The difference was exacerbated with depleted self-regulation.

It is generally believed that a victim of an intimate partner homicide, who faced ongoing physical violence prior to the killing, would have contacted authorities for assistance or protection some time prior to their death. However, the results of this study show that this notion that a victim of ongoing abuse will, more than likely, request help is a misconception. Through qualitative and quantitative methods analysis, this study reveals the dearth of prior reporting of physical violence to law enforcement or the court when an intimate partner homicide takes place between heterosexual spouses in Florida between 2006 and 2016. Additionally, "coercive control," a term that is not nearly as recognizable as domestic violence or intimate partner violence but that should be understood and regulated, was conceptualized and operationalized using NVivo Pro 12, a qualitative social sciences software package. By constructing an original data set from secondary data from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Uniform Crime Report Supplemental Homicide Report, multiple law enforcement agencies from throughout the state of Florida, and many Florida county courthouses, variables of intimate partner homicide were analyzed in unique quantitative models using IBM SPSS, an advanced statistical software analysis program. Also, as part of the content analysis process, Petitions for Injunction for Protection against Domestic Violence were organized, coded, and analyzed to provide insight into the role coercive control takes prior to an intimate partner homicide. This study sheds light on the fact that the emphasis on physical violence in intimate partner abuse, rather than the non-violent tactics of coercive control, for lethality risk assessments for intimate partner violence victims is misplaced and warrants reconsideration.

Ample research explores individual factors associated with sexual violence, yet individual, dyadic, and environmental influences on intimate partner sexual violence (IPSV) occurring in the larger context of non-intimate partner violence (NIPSV) remain relatively unexplored. The current study aimed to determine the extent to which county-level indicators in combination with individual and dyadic factors are associated with sexual violence across relationship types. Reported IPSV and NIPSV cases were obtained from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s (TBI) online incident-based reporting system. County-level variables indicative of neighborhood physical disorder, violent crime, income inequality, firearm prevalence, and community alcohol use patterns were retrieved from the online resource County Health Rankings and Roadmaps. Using a nested case–control design, we determined significant sexual violence risk within younger cohorts and across relationship types, finding three significant county-level factors: 1) income inequality, 2) rate of firearm fatalities, and 3) percentage of female residents. Suggested prevention and intervention efforts include targeting younger age groups for IPSV and NIPSV education, developing resources for a range of relational partners, improving legal access and law enforcement training for reporting, and continued examination of the role of firearms.

Women’s use of aggression in intimate partner relationships is consistently debated by researchers of intimate partner aggression. One tenet suggests women use aggression within intimate relationships at similar rates as men. Conversely, a second tenet acknowledges women’s use of aggression but suggests that the meaning and consequences associated with women’s aggression is not coercive or severely injurious, which are typical characteristics of men’s use of aggression. The current study evaluated incarcerated women in order to build upon an integrative approach that suggests that women’s use of aggression is related to the relationship dynamics generated from variations in coercive and conflictual behaviors. Further, the current study evaluated the moderating relation of childhood abuse history and posttraumatic stress symptoms between relationship dynamics and women’s use of aggression. Ninety-six women, who participated in a larger research project that investigated incarcerated women’s life experience, reported on the dynamics of their most recent abusive heterosexual relationship, their own use of aggression (minor and severe) and childhood abuse history and posttraumatic stress symptoms. Findings suggest that incarcerated women involved in intimate relationships characterized as highly conflictual use significantly more minor and severe aggression toward their partners than women involved in relationships with low levels of conflicts. The finding is significant regardless of the level of coercion present in the relationship. Lastly, neither childhood abuse history nor posttraumatic symptoms moderated the relation between intimate partner relationship dynamics and women’s use of aggression. Various reasons for the lack of support for the moderating effect of history on women’s use of aggression are discussed.

Research has consistently shown that intimate partner homicide (IPH) rates have been on a steady downward decline over the past two decades. A relatively recent movement in IPH research, however, has emphasized the need for further dissecting the aggregate trends by factors such as gender, race, and victim-offender relationship. In response to these issues, this study looks at the relationship between IPHs and factors such as gender, race, and age. The present study explores officially reported IPH cases in Dallas, Texas between the years 1990-1997. Specific attention will be paid to the victim's and suspect's age, race, and gender. The findings of the study will assist in identifying significant characteristics of these IPH incidents which may lead to a greater understanding of the types of relationships in which IPH is more likely to occur. Studying the relationship between IPHs and these factors, as this research aims to do, is important to understanding what IPH incident characteristics need more attention to help prevent future incidents from occurring. As a result of this research, a better understanding of whether IPH may occur in certain types of relationships will be reached and then can be further utilized to educate.

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and intimate partner violence (IPV) are both crimes with high prevalence rates which frequently have females as their victims. Survivors of each are frequently found in psychotherapy, yet to date few studies have examined the interaction between each form of gender violence. The present study looked at several ways in which CSA and IPV interact, including assessing prevalence rates of CSA among female IPV survivors, examining somatic difficulties found among female CSA survivors who are also survivors of IPV vs. female non-CSA IPV survivor controls, and by exploring body image and sexual difficulties found among female CSA survivors who are also survivors of IPV vs. female non-CSA IPV survivor controls. Participants were a sample of 140 women with a history of domestic violence recruited from a variety of settings including community mental health facilities and correctional facilities. Results showed that all three forms of childhood maltreatment studied (CSA, childhood physical abuse (CPA), and childhood witnessing of IPV) were elevated among survivors of IPV; rates of CSA were 51.4% within our sample of female survivors of IPV, rates of CPA were 52.1%, and rates of childhood witnessing of IPV were 67.1% within the same sample. Among various somatic complaints studied (sleep difficulties, depression, eating difficulties, and weight problems), female CSA survivors of IPV evidenced higher rates of childhood sleep difficulties, childhood and adulthood depression, and adulthood eating difficulties than did female non-CSA IPV survivor controls. While participants overall evidenced high rates of problems with body image and sexuality, there were no significant differences between female CSA survivors of IPV and female non-CSA IPV survivor controls within this study. Possible reasons underlying the latter negative findings were discussed. Both groups showed higher rates of body image and sexual dysfunction than would be predicted for normative participants, though given the absence of a normal control group in the present study it is difficult to discern how much higher these rates might be.

Background: The HIV/AIDS pandemic has largely affected women in Africa. Apart from the physiological susceptibility to HIV infection, factors such as intimate partner violence (IPV) are considered to heighten the risk of infection for women. In 2009, sixty percent of all new infections were contracted within married unions in Zambia. HIV prevalence rates for women continue to remain high in Zambia while IPV is a rampant social problem in this society. Thus, this study examines the relationship between intimate partner violence and HIV status of currently married women in Zambia. Methods: The study used the 2007 Zambian Demographic and Health Survey data to achieve the objectives of the study. The study included a sample of 2 895 currently married women aged 15-49 who participated in the domestic violence module and the HIV test. The main independent variable of the study was IPV and covariates included: age of respondent, age at sexual debut, religion, highest education level, household wealth index, place of residence, the country’s provinces, partners age and partners education. The dependent variable of the study was HIV status. Data analysis was conducted in three stages. First ly, a univariate analysis was conducted to show the prevalence’s of HIV and IPV. A bivariate analysis was also conducted; which illustrate the distribution of the population’s characteristics by the dependent variable. Secondly, Binomial Logistic regression was used to examine the relationships between each of the independent variables and dependent variable. Thirdly, Multivariate Logistic Regression was used to examine the relationship between IPV and HIV status while controlling for selected covariates. Results: HIV prevalence of 14 percent was found among currently married women while 43 percent of the women experienced violence from an intimate partner. It was found that women who experienced both physical and sexual violence were more likely to be HIV positive. The more educated and affluent the women were; the more likely they were to be HIV positive. Age of the respondent and partner’s age were also found to have significant relationships with the HIV status of women. Conclusion In Zambia, there was a relationship found between IPV and the HIV status of currently married women. The sustained high prevalence of IPV and HIV amongst women in Zambia is of social and public health concern and should be addressed if the country wants to effectively reduce the infection rate of