ArticlePDF Available

Domestic Violence, Children's Agency and Mother–Child Relationships: Towards a More Advanced Model

Authors:

Abstract

Available for FREE from: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/chso.12023/full Although domestic violence research increasingly recognises children's agency, this awareness has not extended to our understanding of children's relationships with their abused mothers. Findings suggesting that some children actively support their mother, and encourage her to leave the perpetrator, have been consistently under-discussed. This article argues that the model of parent–child relationships used by most domestic violence research sees children as passive and contributes to mother-blaming discourses. Analysing key quantitative and qualitative research, I suggest that a more sophisticated model of parent–child relationships is needed to understand how children's agency affects them, their mothers and the domestic violence situation.
Domestic Violence, Children’s Agency and
MotherChild Relationships: Towards a
More Advanced Model
Emma Katz
School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK
Although domestic violence research increasingly recognises children’s agency, this awareness has not
extended to our understanding of children’s relationships with their abused mothers. Findings suggesting
that some children actively support their mother, and encourage her to leave the perpetrator, have been
consistently under-discussed. This article argues that the model of parentchild relationships used by
most domestic violence research sees children as passive and contributes to mother-blaming discourses.
Analysing key quantitative and qualitative research, I suggest that a more sophisticated model of parent
child relationships is needed to understand how children’s agency affects them, their mothers and the
domestic violence situation. ©2013 The Author(s) Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s
Bureau and Blackwell Publishing Limited.
Keywords: agency, bilateral model, domestic violence, mother-blaming, parentification.
Introduction
Motherchild relationships are increasingly seen as important to the resilience and well-
being of children experiencing domestic violence (Sturge-Apple and others, 2010). A posi-
tive relationship with their non-abusing parent (usually their mother) is thought to help
protect these children from negative outcomes (Letourneau and others, 2007). However,
there has been little scrutiny of the underlying model of motherchild relationships used in
the domestic violence research field. Recent work has critiqued this field’s tendency to view
children as passive victims and ignore their coping strategies and agency (Overlien and
Hyden, 2009). However, this work is relatively new and has focused on calling for more
recognition of children’s agency as individual survivors of domestic violence, not as family
members. Here, I extend this work by providing an original analysis of the extent to which
domestic violence research recognises children’s agency in its model of parentchild
relationships.
In the first section, I discuss the small amount of domestic violence research that focuses
on children’s agency and actions. I review this work’s innovative findings, which suggest
that some children actively support their mother and siblings and wish to play direct roles
in decision-making about the domestic violence. This understanding of children’s agency
has featured prominently outside domestic violence research, and the second section
explores the recommendation of Kuczynski and others (1999) and Kuczynski (2003) that
unilateral models of parentchild relationships (i.e. those focusing on parents’ actions and
seeing children as passive) be replaced with a bilateral model that sees both parents and
children as active. Returning to the domestic violence research field, the third section
reviews key studies on domestic violence and motherchild relationships. It argues that
much of this work, influenced by unilateral models, ignores or minimises children’s agency
in relation to their parents. In the fourth section, I contend that this influence contributes
CHILDREN & SOCIETY VOLUME 29, (2015) pp. 69–79
DOI:10.1111/chso.12023
©2013 The Author(s)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
to mother/victim-blaming and inhibits understanding of cases that show children actively
supporting their abused mother. Here, effects on practice will be considered. Finally, I con-
clude that to enhance our understandings of how positive motherchild relationships help
children survive domestic violence, we must begin to recognise children’s agency and the
bilateral nature of parentchild relationships.
The use of childhood studies in domestic violence research
Theoretical developments
According to Prout and James (1997), children are conventionally seen as incomplete, vul-
nerable beings who are acted upon by adults and society. This view has been questioned in
the last three decades by scholars working within ‘childhood studies’ (Qvortrup and others,
2009). These scholars emphasise that children not only accept circumstances but influence
and modify them. At the core of this argument is a reconceptualisation of children as active
beings with the capacity to use agency. It is rare for contributors to this field to define the
concept of agency they are using (Valentine, 2011). However, many appear to view agency
as something that does not necessarily require rationality and freedom, and may be exercised
by people with mixed feelings and under constrained circumstances.
It is only in the last ten years that a small number of scholars working in the domestic
violence research field have begun to incorporate innovations from childhood studies into
their work (Eriksson and Nasman, 2008; Mullender and others, 2002; Overlien and Hyden,
2009). These researchers are critical of how children are framed in the majority of domestic
violence research, which tends to focus on the damage they have sustained (Holt and others,
2008). Arguing that children are often seen as passive witnesses who ‘suffer in silence’ (Over-
lien and Hyden, 2009, p. 479), and are ‘marginalized as a source of information about their
own lives’ (Mullender and others, 2002, p. 3), these researchers have emphasised that chil-
dren who experience domestic violence are capable of making decisions, taking actions and
influencing their surroundings.
Empirical results and implications
The emerging domestic violence research inspired by childhood studies is yielding surprising
results. Although children experience serious negative impacts from living with domestic
violence, many children in this situation (a) wish to be treated as agentic and take active
roles in decision-making, and (b) are more active in supporting themselves and others than
was previously thought. These points are best illustrated in a study by Mullender and others
(2002), based on in-depth interviews with 24 mothers and 54 children (aged 8-17). Their
results suggest that it is important for children to ‘[be] listened to and taken seriously as par-
ticipants in the domestic violence situation’ (p. 121). Child participants in their study em-
phasised a wish to be informed and active in finding solutions:
Grown-ups think they should hide it and shouldn’t tell us but we want to know. We want to be
involved and we want our mums to talk with us about what they are going to do we could help
make decisions. (p. 129)
Furthermore, many children in the study discussed coping strategies that included taking
agentic roles, and encouraged other children experiencing domestic violence to be active in
supporting their mother and siblings:
Help your mother be strong; Give your mum advice because sometimes she can’t think straight;
Have lots of cuddles with your mum and your brothers and sisters; Talk to your brothers and sisters;
70 Emma Katz
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
Get lots of reassurance and love from your mother; If you are a child, think what your mum is
going through; Stick to your mum. (p. 234)
This concept of children as agentic subjects is opening up space in domestic violence
research. In a field that continues to be dominated by the question of how children are dam-
aged by domestic violence, it has raised questions of what children do and how they take
action when living with domestic violence. Perhaps most important, it has begun to suggest
that children’s agency may be more extensive than previously thought. Children may not
only protect themselves but also play a role in supporting the other survivor(s) of domestic
violence in their family, including their mother.
Parentchild relationships: unilateral versus bilateral models
To integrate these new findings into the wider knowledge-base of domestic violence research,
I believe it is important not only to continue recognising children’s agency as individuals,
but to engage with recent innovations outside the field that enhance understandings of par-
entchild relationships. For example, work in developmental psychology by Kuczynski and
others (1999) and Kuczynski (2003), available for over a decade, has highlighted how tradi-
tional research into families has been prevented from fully understanding its findings by a
unilateral model of parentchild relations.
According to Kuczynski and others (1999):
Research [in this area] has been constrained by []aunilateral model of parent child-relationships
[] where influence was assumed to flow in one direction, from parent to child [Within this
model] parents were considered to be active agents capable of meaning construction and intentional
action. Children were considered to be either passive recipients or victims of parental practices
whose capacities for meaning construction and intentional action was usually ignored. (p. 25, origi-
nal emphasis)
To overcome the unilateral model’s limitations, Kuczynski and others developed a bilat-
eral model of parentchild relations. The bilateral model views causality in parentchild
relationships as ‘bi-directional’: i.e. children influence parents and parents influence
children. This model also assumes that parents and children have equal amounts of
agency, although not necessarily equal amounts of power to exercise it. Using the bilat-
eral model, a parentchild relationship may therefore be seen as two-directional. It con-
tains both parent-to-child directions of influence and child-to-parent directions of
influence. It is the dynamic interaction between these directions that creates the parent
child relationship.
The shift from a unilateral to bilateral model has opened up new areas of research into
family dynamics, enabling scholars to address previously neglected questions such as how
children ‘deliberately intervene to change parental behaviours, beliefs and attitudes’ (Kuczyn-
ski and others, 1999, p. 46). Outside the domestic violence research field, this is enabling
scholars to develop fuller accounts of children’s agency, their influence on their parents, and
their dynamic contributions to family life. Studies using bilateral models outside this field
are also suggesting that children often see mutual supportiveness and problem-sharing
between themselves and their parents as healthy and normal (Arditti, 1999; Morrow, 2003).
The domestic violence research field cannot afford to ignore these advances in parent
child relationship theory. A bilateral model of parentchild relations seems particularly help-
ful to understand recent findings that some children act to support their abused mothers. We
therefore need to examine the extent to which the unilateral model is still prevalent in
domestic violence research.
DV, Agency & Mother-Child Relationships 71
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
The dominance of the unilateral model in domestic violence research
Focusing on mothers’ parenting
The unilateral model appears to have a strong influence on domestic violence research, shap-
ing scholars’ approaches to motherchild relationships and often making mothers’ actions
appear as the only factor worth analysing. For example, Letourneau and others (2007) state
that they conducted ‘an analysis of the relationships between parents and children exposed
to domestic violence’ (p. 655), but, in practice, their study only analysed one half of this
relationship: namely, the parenting practices of mothers. This approach does not account for
children’s contributions to the motherchild relationship. Rather, in accordance with the view
of the unilateral model, it suggests that that mothers’ parenting is the parentchild relation-
ship.
This tendency to reduce explorations of motherchild relationships to examinations of
mother’s parenting may also be seen within the broader stream of research into domestic
violence and motherchild relationships that has emerged in the last decade. This research,
drawing on clinical psychology and using primarily quantitative methods, focuses almost
exclusively on the parenting of abused mothers, and its links to the presence or absence of
behaviour problems in their children (Hungerford and others, 2012). For example, studies
have examined the effects on children of mothers’ symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disor-
der (PTSD) (Johnson and Lieberman, 2007), mothers’ mental health (Levendosky and others,
2006), their parenting behaviours/parenting stress (Huth-Bocks and Hughes, 2008) and their
parenting effectiveness (Gewirtz and others, 2011). Most recently, research has begun to
explore how mothers mediate the relationship between exposure to domestic violence and
children’s neurocognitive functioning (Samuelson and others, 2012). Overall, the usual
conclusion in the field is that ‘maternal parenting behaviours may play key explanatory roles
in understanding associations between inter-parental violence and children’s adjustment
difficulties’ (Sturge-Apple and others, 2010, p. 45, my emphasis).
Mothers as active, children as passive
In addition to affecting the way parentchild relationships are studied, the unilateral model
appears to influence how mothers and children are conceptualised. According to Kuczynski
and others (1999), this model views parents as powerful actors and children as ‘passive recip-
ients or victims’ of the behaviour that is handed down by parents (p. 25). This may be seen
in the domestic violence research discussed above, where mothers are imagined as either
‘protecting’ or further ‘damaging’ their children through the quality of their parenting
(Letourneau and others, 2007; Sturge-Apple and others, 2010). For example, in their study of
parenting by abused mothers, Huth-Bocks and Hughes (2008) argue that ‘there is consider-
able evidence that parenting stress has a direct effect on child-adjustment problems’ (p. 245).
Implicitly, children are seen in this stream of research not as subjects who have the capacity
to take deliberate action, but as objects whose successful ‘adjustment’ is determined by their
mothers’ behaviour.
What is excluded from consideration in this research is the other half of the motherchild
relationship: that is, children’s effects on their mothers. The vast majority of studies in this
area do not collect data about children’s agency or their active participation in the mother
child relationship (see Huth-Bocks and Hughes, 2008; Johnson and Lieberman, 2007; Letour-
neau and others, 2007; Levendosky and others, 2006; Samuelson and others, 2012; Sturge-
Apple and others, 2010). The data collected about mothers focus on their ability to take
effective action as a parent, often through measuring their parenting warmth, adaptability,
72 Emma Katz
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
use of discipline, or mental health. Mothers’ actions are examined because they are seen as
agentic. By contrast, children are seen as passive. The data gathered about them (through,
for example, the Child Behavior Checklist or the Children’s Depression Inventory) are almost
always designed to assess whether they are aggressive, withdrawn, depressed, or suffering
from PTSD or other problems, and are therefore limited to recording the level of damage
they have sustained and their resulting behavioural (mal)functioning. These data are rarely
accompanied by data on the active coping strategies children are using or their ways of
interacting with their mother on an everyday basis. As a result, considerations of children’s
agency or actions have been all but missing from the quantitative research on domestic vio-
lence and motherchild relationships.
Impacts of the unilateral model on domestic violence research
Mother-blaming
By viewing mothers as active and children as passive, the unilateral model clearly holds back
the recognition of children’s agency in domestic violence research. However, there are other
drawbacks to this model, which may be seen through an investigation of ‘mother-blaming’
and its established solutions. The form of mother-blaming that is most recognised by the
children and domestic violence field is where the onus is placed on abused mothers to ensure
their children’s well-being, and they are held responsible for ‘failure to protect’ if the chil-
dren are harmed (Lapierre, 2008; Radford and Hester, 2006). This tendency towards mother-
blaming may be seen in the literature on domestic violence and parentchild relationships
analysed in the previous section, which overwhelmingly focuses on motherchild not father
child relationships when attempting to explain children’s behaviour problems (Hungerford
and others, 2012).
As critiques by other scholars have already suggested, this mother-blaming framework
inhibits discussion of the perpetrator, usually the children’s father or father-figure (Eriksson
and others, 2005; Lapierre, 2008). Ignoring the perpetrator has resulted in a failure to
acknowledge that it is his behaviour which is damaging children, or that he is primarily
responsible for any difficulties his partner experiences with her parenting. It has also meant
that most quantitative studies examining the ways that children are harmed by domestic vio-
lence have failed to collect data about the perpetrator’s day-to-day behaviour and parenting
style (Hungerford and others, 2012).
However, the first point I wish to make is that identifying the perpetrator’s responsibility
for the harm done to children (which is the established solution to mother-blaming) often
still involves the unilateral model of parentchild relations and its view of children as pas-
sive. For example, innovative work by Bancroft and Silverman (2002) shows how some per-
petrators confuse their children about who is responsible for the domestic violence and
deliberately undermine the children’s relationships with their mother. However, their work
largely ignores the possibility that children may be agentic in relation to the perpetrator.
When they argue that the perpetrator’s behaviour may ‘shape’ the children’s perceptions of
their parents, and that ‘[c]hildren tend to absorb the batterer’s view of their mother over time’
(p. 11, my emphasis), children are still imagined as passive objects who are directly affected
by the actions of the parent, even if in this case it is the perpetrator and not the mother.
This is problematic because other research has suggested that children do have the capac-
ity to resist manipulation and to reject the perpetrator’s view of the situation. For example,
in the study by Mullender and others (2002), one twelve-year-old girl says: ‘I ask [Dad]
sometimes, when I see him, why he hit Mum. He always says that she hit him first and she
started it, but she didn’t’ (p. 168). Like many other children in the research literature, this girl
DV, Agency & Mother-Child Relationships 73
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
shows an ability to reject her fathers’ assertions. She has a sense of certainty that he started
it, and refuses to ‘absorb’ or be ‘shaped’ by his attempts at manipulation.
I therefore believe it is necessary to approach discussions of parents’ manipulation from
the premise that children are agentic subjects. This would not remove our ability to explore
how children are manipulated, as agentic subjects are still vulnerable to manipulation.
Rather, conceptualising children as agentic subjects capable of constructing meaning, acting
strategically and resisting domination by others would allow researchers wishing to over-
come mother-blaming to explore how children are both manipulated by their domestically
violent fathers and are sometimes able to resist such manipulation.
This leads to my second point, that mother-blaming may result not only from holding
mothers responsible for the harm done to children but also from ignoring the agency of the
child in relation to the mother. This different form of mother-blaming may be seen in a pas-
sage by Holden (2003), who states that ‘one potential problem [] occurs when there is
“parentification”. Here, the mother turns to the child for comfort and support and inappro-
priately discusses the violence and her relationship with the perpetrator’ (p. 158, my empha-
sis). This passage is representative of a common form of mother-blaming in domestic
violence research, which often assumes that (passive) children have been forced into care-
giving roles because their (active) mother has elicited support from them. Admittedly, there
may be cases where abused mothers do look to their children for support and this is experi-
enced as burdensome by children. However, the problem with the unilateral model is that it
automatically assumes that mothers have compelled their children into caring for them.
Research using this model leaves no ground for considering that, in some cases, (active) chil-
dren may choose to support their abused mother or initiate conversations with her about
what is happening.
Interpreting evidence of supportive behaviours by children
This article has examined the quantitative, clinical research on domestic violence and
motherchild relationships, showing that the unilateral model remains at the heart of this
work. As we saw, this has created a strong tendency to view children as passive objects and
parents as all-powerful actors. On the rare occasions when children’s supportiveness towards
their mother is identified, it tends to be viewed as automatically negative or as evidence of
‘parentification’.
This section will therefore look more closely at how the unilateral model is limiting under-
standings of children’s supportiveness towards their abused mothers. I do not wish to suggest
that the primary response of children living with domestic violence is to support their
mother, as motherchild relationships can be severely undermined by domestic violence
(Humphreys and others, 2006). However, much research, including that discussed below, sug-
gests that supporting the mother is one significant reaction which requires further consider-
ation. Here, my analysis widens to include the qualitative feminist or child-centred literature
which, because it allows survivors to give their accounts in their own words, tends to find
more evidence of this behaviour. I will argue that there are a range of supportive behaviours
by children that are visible in this literature but not fully discussed. Even this literature can
be seen to follow the unilateral model by:
a Considering supportiveness to be a parental role that children should not adopt
b Ignoring children’s agency, and focusing on the agency of mothers
c Marginalising cases where children take overt action to help their mothers
d Assuming that children’s attempts to support their mothers are unsuccessful or unrecipro-
cated
74 Emma Katz
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
I will pursue each of these issues in turn through reference to key texts in the existing
domestic violence research literature. My intention here is not to critique the authors of these
texts (especially as they are highlighting other important issues), but to draw attention to
how some children support and advise their mothers and how these purposeful and agentic
behaviours may produce a range of outcomes for mothers, children and other family
members.
Considering supportiveness to be a parental role that children should not adopt
Firstly, because the unilateral model lacks a concept of children’s agency, it sees children’s
supportive actions only in terms of (parental) ‘roles’, which are ‘adopted’ by children, rather
than as a functional part of being a child that may exist alongside the parental roles of
adults. In domestic violence research, this often leads to a negative interpretation of children
supporting their mothers as ‘parentification’, seen, for example, in a review by Holt and
others (2008) which states that: ‘Adolescents may adopt care-taking roles for their mother
and siblings and although this can [be] empower[ing] [] the cost of over parentification is
a lost childhood and the likelihood of severe emotional distress’ (p. 803, my emphasis). The
unilateral model therefore creates a tendency for domestic violence research to assume that
children’s supportiveness towards their mothers is automatically negative, rather than explor-
ing it in a more complex way.
Ignoring children’s agency, and focusing on the agency of mothers
Secondly, the unilateral model expects only mothers, not mothers and children, to be agen-
tic, and this tends to influence the interpretation of findings. For example, Rhodes and others
(2010), who conducted focus-group interviews with thirty-nine women, did not develop an
analysis of the deliberate interventions by children which are evident in their own data.
Their findings include one mother describing how: My daughter’s the one that ended up call-
ing the very last time. The taxi cab, then she called two cabs and said that we need to go
somewhere safe (p. 488, my emphasis)’, and another saying:
When the children were involved [] that helped a lot, especially seeing (my daughter) and her cry,
Mommy, you don’t have to have this happen. I mean, you know, a ten-year-old [] knowing some-
thing that I just couldn’t see [] she was way above the intelligence that I was at that point.
(p. 488, my emphasis)
These quotations seem to indicate that some children play an active role in their mother’s
leaving process. However, in their analysis, Rhodes and others comment on these statements
only to emphasise mothers’ actions and protective roles, which barely feature in the pas-
sages. The first is treated as an example of a mother not wanting ‘her children to have to
take an active role in the process of leaving’ (p. 488), while the second is seen as an instance
where ‘concern for their children motivated mothers to ultimately seek help or leave the rela-
tionship’ (p. 488). Here, the authors explore children’s passive roles as objects of concern, yet
the lack of focus on children’s agency prevents them (and the wider field) from considering
some children’s active roles in mothers’ leaving processes.
Marginalising cases where children take overt action to help their mothers
Thirdly, the unilateral model makes it difficult to fully consider or theorise the motherchild
relationships in which children are most active. An example of this can be seen in the chap-
ter on mother-child relationships by Mullender and others (2002). This chapter shows that,
although some abused mothers and children are too concerned about upsetting each other to
communicate about what is happening, there are also mutually supportive relationships
DV, Agency & Mother-Child Relationships 75
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
where ‘mothers may turn to their children for support [as well as] do[ing] their best to try
and protect their children from knowledge and sight of violence’ (p. 156). However, the
authors provide only minimal illustration of these latter families where children ‘dared to
tell the truth whilst living with the abuse, thus strengthening their mother’s resolve to sepa-
rate’, and ‘shored up [their mothers] decision to make it on their own’ (p. 174) and con-
clude the chapter without reference to them. As the unilateral model does not provide a
framework for understanding the dynamics in these families, they are under-explored, and
opportunities are missed to understand more about the potential impacts of mutual support
between children and mothers.
Assuming that children’s attempts to support their mothers are unsuccessful or unrecipro-
cated
Finally, the unilateral model restricts understanding by shifting focus away from cases where
children’s supportiveness is successful. For example, Epstein and Keep, in their 1995 study of
children’s calls to the helpline ChildLine, report children ‘making suggestions to their moth-
ers [and] encouraging them to leave or separate from their partners’; but they note immedi-
ately that ‘such concern is not always acknowledged or appreciated by the mother herself’
and that ‘[i]t can be confusing and hurtful to a child when their mother does not accept or
act on the advice she gives’ (pp. 4950). This awareness that mothers’ lack of receptiveness
may harm children is important; yet, it is also important to consider that mothers sometimes
are responsive and children’s interventions sometimes are successful (see Rhodes and others,
2010, above) so that these outcomes do not remain invisible in the field.
Effects on practice
We do not know how domestic violence interventions are affected by the unilateral model,
or the difficulties it creates in understanding supportiveness between children and mothers.
However, there are some signs in the literature that the unilateral model does have an effect
on practice and may be undermining the effectiveness of some interventions. For instance,
Mullender and others (2002) note that social workers had not talked to some of the children
in their study or given them opportunities to share in decision-making. The authors suggest
that ‘some of the children [] had wanted so much to be active in coping with the difficul-
ties that it appeared they might have been subjected to further unnecessary detrimental
effects by being prevented from doing so’ (p. 129). Although Mullender and others do not
discuss this, it is possible that for the children in their study who coped by supporting their
mother and siblings, this exclusion from decision-making may have been particularly dis-
tressing.
Furthermore, Bancroft and Silverman (2002) argue that, in the US, the children who are
most able to remain close to their mother and see their father’s abuse as wrong may be the
most likely to be forced into a continuing, unwanted relationship with him post-separation.
This is because:
Families who remain the most unified and who have the greatest degree of psychological health
among mothers and children appear to be among the most vulnerable to being labelled as having
‘parental alienation’, which can result in forced visitation for children with the batterer or even a
change to being in his custody. (p. 82)
Once again, this tendency may be attributed to the unilateral model, which does not
recognise that children have the capacity for ‘meaning construction’ or ‘intentional action’
(Kuczynski and others, 1999). Professionals influenced by this model may see children as
incapable of independently deciding to cease contact with their violent father (Eriksson and
76 Emma Katz
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
others, 2005). In practice, this model may therefore have serious consequences, with mothers
being blamed for children’s decisions and children’s decisions being ignored or overruled.
Redefining strong, positive motherchild relationships
It is necessary to return now to the question of what a strong, positive motherchild rela-
tionship looks like in the context of domestic violence. The motherchild relationships that
are usually connected with children’s resilience, healthy adaptation or well-being are the
ones where mothers have been able to maintain a ‘high standard of parenting’ (Letourneau
and others, 2007). While this is undoubtedly an important factor, it is also possible to see
that this view reflects the limited nature of the unilateral model, which only focuses on
mothers’ parenting while ignoring children’s agency and their contributions to the parent
child relationship (Kuczynski and others, 1999).
By contrast, the bilateral model conceptualises positive parentchild relationships as ones
where agentic children and parents support each other. It is not yet clear how this model
might apply to families experiencing domestic violence. However, there are some indications
in existing research that, where children have gone down the route of supporting their
abused mother and this support has been valued and reciprocated, children (and mothers)
may experience more positive outcomes. Some research literature, although usually still con-
strained by issues a-d discussed above, is beginning to suggest what these positive outcomes
may involve. For example:
In cases where the mothers and children succeed in remaining unified against a batterer [and] sup-
porting each other [] the mother may increase her self-esteem and self-confidence [] We have
spoken to a number of battered women who state that their relationships with their children were an
important factor in their being able to ultimately leave the abuser. (Bancroft and Silverman, 2002,
p. 77, my emphasis)
Our findings indicate that closeness among family members is key in creating a new, supportive fam-
ily climate [post separation]. In many cases, closeness and teamwork result in relationships between
[mothers] and children that, when viewed through a traditional lens, are most consistent with that of
‘peers’ [] Our findings suggest the need for cautious assessments of such relationships and recogni-
tion of their benefits in families with a history of Interpersonal Violence. (Wuest and Merritt-Gray,
2004, p. 272, my emphasis)
[Children] talked openly about [] formulating plans, and attempting to take responsibility for their
mothers and siblings and overall for seeking out solutions. This type of involvement might mitigate
in favour of improved outcomes for the children when they reach adulthood. (Hague and others,
2012, p. 30, my emphasis)
These quotations suggest that it may be necessary for domestic violence research to widen
its vision and understanding of what makes a positive motherchild relationship. Shifting to a
bilateral model of parentchild relationships may be seen as an important part of this process.
Conclusion
There are underlying models or ways of thinking that influence a field of research, shaping
the way that issues are viewed and questions are asked. Outside the field of domestic vio-
lence research, there have been strong critiques of the unilateral model that focuses only on
parents’ actions. Bilateral models have been developed, conceptualising children as agentic
subjects and exploring how both parents and children contribute to parentchild relation-
ships. Inside domestic violence research, these models have generally not been utilised and
the field continues to be influenced heavily by the unilateral model.
DV, Agency & Mother-Child Relationships 77
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
Incorporating a bilateral model into domestic violence research would represent a signifi-
cant advancement. It would allow this research to explore parentchild relationships in more
sophisticated ways, enabling us to consider the variety of different means by which some
children may be actively supporting their mothers, the mix of positive and negative impacts
this may have, and the particular ways these mothers and children may experience domestic
violence policies and practices. This shift would not prevent us from continuing to explore
families where children support their mothers little if at all and, conversely, those where
children perform caring roles that are ‘excessive’ (two areas which have already received
much attention in the literature to date, although with little focus on agency). Rather, it
would create a space where children’s agency in parentchild relationships may be recogni-
sed and not automatically seen as negative. This would provide a nuanced awareness of
when children’s caring roles cross into excess, and produce a more advanced insight into the
positive and negative impacts of supportiveness between abused mothers and children.
Above all, shifting to a bilateral model may increase our understandings of how children
themselves experience domestic violence and why living with it damages some children
more, and some less, than others.
Acknowledgements
This article draws on research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant
no. ES/I011935/1).
References
Arditti JA. 1999. Rethinking relationships between divorced mothers and their children: capitalizing on
family strengths. Family Relations 48: 109119.
Bancroft L, Silverman JG. 2002. The Batterer as Parent: Addressing the Impact of Domestic Violence on
Family Dynamics. Sage: London.
Epstein C, Keep G. 1995. What children tell ChildLine about domestic violence. In ‘It Hurts Me Too’:
Children’s Experiences of Domestic Violence and Refuge Life. Saunders A, Epstein C, Keep G, Debbo-
naire T (eds.). WAFE/Childline/NISW: Bristol; 4357.
Eriksson M, Nasman E. 2008. Participation in family law proceedings for children whose father is vio-
lent to their mother. Childhood 15: 259275.
Eriksson M, Hester M, Keskinen S, Pringle K. 2005. Tackling Men’s Violence in Families: Nordic Issues
and Dilemmas. Policy Press: Bristol.
Gewirtz AH, Medhanie A, DeGarmo DS. 2011. Effects of mother’s parenting practices on child internal-
izing trajectories following partner violence. Journal of Family Psychology 25:2938.
Hague G, Harvey A, Willis K. 2012. Understanding Adult Survivors of Domestic Violence in Childhood:
Still Forgotten, Still Hurting. Jessica Kingsley: London.
Holden GW. 2003. Children exposed to domestic violence and child abuse: terminology and taxonomy.
Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review 6: 151160.
Holt S, Buckley H, Whelan S. 2008. The impact of exposure to domestic violence on children and
young people: a review of the literature. Child Abuse and Neglect 32: 797810.
Humphreys C, Mullender A, Thiara R, Skamballis A. 2006. ‘Talking to my mum’: developing communi-
cation between mothers and children in the aftermath of domestic violence. Journal of Social Work
6:5363.
Hungerford A, Wait SK, Fritz AM, Clements CM. 2012. Exposure to intimate partner violence and chil-
dren’s psychological adjustment, cognitive functioning, and social competence: a review. Aggression
and Violent Behaviour 17: 373382.
Huth-Bocks AC, Hughes HM. 2008. Parenting stress, parenting behavior, and children’s adjustment in
families experiencing intimate partner violence. Journal of Family Violence 23: 243251.
78 Emma Katz
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
Johnson VK, Lieberman AF. 2007. Variations in behaviour problems of preschoolers exposed to domes-
tic violence: the role of mothers’ attunement to children’s emotional experiences. Journal of Family
Violence 22: 297308.
Kuczynski L. 2003. Beyond bidirectionality: bilateral conceptual frameworks for understanding dynam-
ics in parentchild relations. In Handbook of Dynamics in ParentChild Relations. Kuczynski L (ed.).
Sage: London; 324.
Kuczynski L, Harach L, Bernardini SC. 1999. Psychology’s child meets sociology’s child: agency, influ-
ence and power in parent-child relationships. In Through the Eyes of the Child: Revisioning Children
as Active Agents of Family Life. Shehan S (ed.). JAI Press: Stamford, CT; 2151.
Lapierre S. 2008. Mothering in the context of domestic violence: the pervasiveness of a deficit model
of mothering. Child and Family Social Work 13: 454463.
Letourneau NL, Fedick CB, Willms JD. 2007. Mothering and domestic violence: a longitudinal analysis.
Journal of Family Violence 22: 649659.
Levendosky AA, Leahy KL, Bogat GA, Davidson WS, von Eye A. 2006. Domestic violence, maternal
parenting, maternal mental health, and infant externalizing behaviour. Journal of Family Psychology
20: 544552.
Morrow V. 2003. Perspectives on children’s agency within families: a view from the sociology of child-
hood. In Handbook of Dynamics in ParentChild Relations. Kuczynski S (ed.). Sage: London; 109
129.
Mullender A, Hague G, Imam U, Kelly L, Malos E, Regan L. 2002. Children’s Perspectives on Domestic
Violence. Sage: London.
Overlien C, Hyden M. 2009. Children’s actions when experiencing domestic violence. Childhood 16:
479497.
Prout A, James A. 1997. A new paradigm for the sociology of childhood?: provenance, promises and
problems. In Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood: Contemporary Issues in the Sociological
Study of Childhood. James A, Prout A (eds.). 2nd edn. RoutledgeFalmer: London; 133.
Qvortrup J, Corsaro WA, Honig M-S (eds.). 2009. The Palgrave Handbook of Childhood Studies. Palgrave
Macmillan: Basingstoke.
Radford L, Hester M. 2006. Mothering Through Domestic Violence. Jessica Kingsley: London.
Rhodes KV, Cerulli C, Dichter ME, Kothari CL, Barg FK. 2010. ‘I didn’t want to put them through that’:
the influence of children on victim decision-making in intimate partner violence cases. Journal of
Family Violence 25: 485493.
Samuelson KW, Krueger CE, Wilson C. 2012. Relationships between maternal emotion regulation, par-
enting, and children’s executive functioning in families exposed to intimate partner violence. Journal
of Interpersonal Violence 27: 35323550.
Sturge-Apple ML, Davies PT, Cicchetti D, Manning LG. 2010. Mother’s parenting practices as explana-
tory mechanisms in associations between interparental violence and child adjustment. Partner Abuse
1:4560.
Valentine K. 2011. Accounting for agency. Children and Society 25: 347358.
Wuest J, Merritt-Gray M. 2004. Regenerating family: strengthening the emotional health of mothers
and children in the context of intimate partner violence. Advancing in Nursing Sciences 27: 257
274.
*Correspondence to: Emma Katz, School of Sociology and Social Policy, Law and Social Sciences Building,
University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK, Tel.: +44 (0)7528309389; Fax: +44 (0)115 9515232.
E-mail: lqxelka@nottingham.ac.uk
Accepted for publication 7 December 2012
DV, Agency & Mother-Child Relationships 79
©2013 The Author(s) CHILDREN & SOCIETY Vol. 29, 69–79 (2015)
Children & Society ©2013 National Children’s Bureau and Blackwell Publish ing Limited.
... The feminist perspective appraises IPV as a gender-based social problem and places the emphasis on the abused mothers' predicaments, thus avoiding victim-and mother-blaming (Buchanan & Wendt, 2018;Lapierre, 2010;Moulding et al., 2015;Peled & Gil, 2011;Semaan et al., 2013). The child-centered perspective underlines children's agency and strengths, thus avoiding labeling them as passive witnesses of parental IPV (Katz, 2015a;Kong & Hooper, 2018;Mullender et al., 2002), tackling the unequal adult-child power relation (Dedding et al., 2015;Graham et al., 2015;Haring et al., 2019;Kirk, 2007) between child-and-researcher and child-and-mother, and asserting their interpretations and perspectives in this research context (Wong & Ho, 2022). Ethical approval was obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committee of The University of Hong Kong before data collection. ...
... Their bidirectional and spontaneous communications and interactions revealed that they valued their togetherness, respected each other's boundaries and achieved their strong partnership. These findings provide a new dimension of evidence to substantiate previous studies conveying that both the mothers and children were active agents contributing to their relationship (Goldblatt et al., 2014;Katz, 2015a;Kong & Hooper, 2018;Neustifter et al., 2015). The mothers could function well in parenting regardless of their IPV victimization (Letourneau et al., 2007;Pels et al., 2015;Tailor et al., 2015). ...
Article
Full-text available
Purpose This study aimed to examine the explicit and implicit aspects of mother–child relationship to explain changes in the relationship led by changes in the context of intimate partner violence (IPV) over time. The explicit mother–child relationship involves verbal and conscious communications, while the implicit relationship consists of nonverbal and nonconscious interactions. Method Grounded Theory was employed to assert the participant perspectives as most important. Participants included 33 Chinese mother–child survivors (13 mothers and 20 children) who were residents and ex-residents of a shelter for abused women and their children in Hong Kong. Data on their explicit relationship was collected from qualitative individual interviews. An art-based method, Joint Painting Procedure (JPP), was applied to obtain dyadic mother–child data on their implicit relationship. Results The integrated model, “Dynamic changes in mother–child relationship in the context of IPV”, was grounded in three main parts of findings. First, the participants’ intersecting social identities and backgrounds. Second, the changes in their explicit relational dynamics led by the transitions in the context of IPV. Third, their bidirectional and reciprocal implicit relational dynamics elicited through their JPP and post-painting discussions. Conclusion The integrated model has significant implications for professional interventions at the post-separation stage. First, IPV is an intersectional social problem requiring social and policy changes, and consideration of diversities among mother–child survivors. Second, the mother–child relationship and the context of IPV are dynamic and changing instead of static. Third, the implicit relationship provides a new dimension for professional interventions to strengthen the mother–child relationship.
... Cumpre destacar os achados de Carlson e colaboradores (2019) Tais dados não apenas sublinham a complexidade dos casos permeados por violência, como também a necessidade de uma análise sistêmica para a proposição de intervenções adequadas nestes contextos. É de suma importância que todos os envolvidos em um lar violento sejam acompanhados e ouvidos, e não somente as vítimas diretas (Katz, 2015;Patias et al., 2014). Espera-se que os dados da presente revisão sistemática contribuam tanto para a condução de pesquisas na área, quanto para a formação de profissionais que atuam em contextos de VPI. ...
... Em consonância com a revisão realizada por D'Affonseca e Williams (2011), os autores assinalaram que apoio emocional, práticas adequadas de disciplinamento, consistência, envolvimento parental, e aceitação associaram-se a resultados positivos para crianças e adolescentes expostos à VPI. Assim, relações positivas entre mãe e filhos podem se tornar um fator de proteção para o desenvolvimento, constituindo uma importante fonte de segurança, afeto, proteção e bem-estar no contexto da VPI.Katz (2015) destaca que o apoio mútuo na díade mãe-filho, interações mais agradáveis e o fortalecimento de vínculos podem auxiliar na minimização dos efeitos da VPI tanto para as mães quanto para as crianças.Outro ponto que merece destaque refere-se à fonte de dados. A maioria das pesquisas utilizaram as mães como fonte de dados sobre a exposição das crianças à VPI. ...
Article
Full-text available
O presente estudo teve como objetivo revisar a literatura nacional e internacional de 2010 a 2021 sobre os impactos da exposição à violência por parceiros íntimos no desenvolvimento infantil. Foi realizada uma busca nas bases de dados Scopus, NCBI/Pubmed, Web of Science, BVS e Scielo, utilizando os seguintes descritores: domestic violence, violence against woman, marital violence, intimate partner violence e child. A revisão permitiu verificar que a exposição direta e indireta à VPI durante a infância pode acarretar prejuízos nas mais diversas esferas do desenvolvimento infantil.
... Children have previously been referred to as "silent witnesses" or "invisible victims" (Osofsky, 1995), and many scholars have demonstrated that in the face of domestic abuse, children may have agentic ways of coping (Callaghan et al., 2015). Specifically, they often actively participate in theirs and their mother's recoveries during and in the aftermath of domestic abuse (Katz, 2015). Furthermore, they may use various strategies to resist violence, manage their familial relationships and attempt to seek safety (Överlien, 2017;Överlien & Hydén, 2009). ...
Article
Full-text available
Domestic abuse in childhood is seriously impactful, but very little literature uses a critical lens to consider implications for counsellors and psychotherapists working with young adults following domestic abuse in childhood. This article draws on research that explored 10 young women's accounts of transitions to adulthood after domestic abuse in childhood. Interviews with young adult women in England were conducted and a feminist dialogical narrative analysis was used. Findings suggest that socio-cultural structures and ideologies that shape dominant discourses about what growing up after domestic abuse in childhood means, and what "successful" adult femininity looks like, shaped how women made sense of their experiences. This has implications for counsellors and psychotherapists working with this client group. This article concludes that storytelling could be a powerful therapeutic tool, and attention to power, ambiguity and tensions when working with this client group might facilitate and generate important meaning-making and knowledge in therapy.
Article
Full-text available
The use of the concept of “agency,” in the sense of action that is to some extent free of “structural” constraints, has enjoyed enormous and growing popularity in the sociological literature over the past several decades. In a previous paper, we examined the range of theoretical rationales offered by sociologists for the inclusion of the notion of “agency” in sociological explanations. Having found these rationales seriously wanting, in this paper we attempt to determine empirically what role “agency” actually plays in the recent sociological literature. We examine a random sample of 147 articles in sociology journals that use the concept of “agency” with the aim of identifying the ways in which the term is used and what function the concept serves in the sociological explanations offered. We identify four principal (often overlapping) uses of “agency”: (1) purely descriptive; (2) as a synonym for “power”; (3) as a way to identify resistance to “structural” pressures; and (4) as a way to describe intelligible human actions. We find that in none of these cases the notion of “agency” adds anything of analytical or explanatory value. These different uses have one thing in common, however: they all tend to use the term “agency” in a strongly normative sense to mark the actions the authors approve of. We conclude that “agency” seems to serve the purpose of registering the authors' moral or political preferences under the guise of a seemingly analytical concept.
Article
Objective Drawing upon family systems theory, Burton's childhood adultification model, and Johnson's typology of domestic violence (DV), the objective of this qualitative study was to understand the adultification experiences of young adults who were exposed to DV while growing up. Background Exposure to DV negatively impacts familial dynamics, disrupting healthy boundaries between caregivers and children. Often associated with families experiencing poverty, adultification is a type of boundary infringement that places children in adult‐like roles to execute essential family tasks with potentially dangerous and developmentally harmful effects. A growing body of literature documents how youth are agentic in navigating their family dynamics and how abusive partners use children as abuse tools. However, adultification in a DV context remains understudied. Method Using a qualitative study design, the research team interviewed 23 college‐attending young adults with father‐mother‐perpetrated DV exposure histories who resided in the Southeastern United States. The qualitative data were analyzed using theoretical thematic analysis. Findings We identified five distinct yet interrelated ways in which young adults with DV exposure histories experienced adultification: intervening to protect mothers from violence, serving as mothers' emotional support system, shielding siblings from violence and conflict, caring for siblings' daily needs, and managing parents' health and well‐being. The young adults categorized as exposed to coercive controlling violence described more extensive adultification. Conclusion Centering adultification in the context of family violence provides a lens through which researchers, practitioners, and other professionals can understand how DV impacts family dynamics, including adultified children.
Article
Mothers who experience DFV are often at risk of being epistemically harmed by professional discourses that are mother‐blaming because professionals often overburden them with unrealistic expectations of protecting their children. In addition, children and young people who experience DFV are frequently at risk of being subjected to epistemic injustice by professional discourses that negate them as knowledge generators. Added to this tangle of epistemic misplacement is the wedge that perpetrators drive between mothers and children so they both cannot see each other survivance wisdom and connection to each other. Family‐inclusive/lead therapy that epistemically privileges mothers' and children's survivance wisdom can repair the damage done to them as knowledge generators and to their relationships. This article describes an example of nondeliberative work that highlights family‐inclusive/lead therapy has a place in family intervention post‐DFV.
Article
Children’s agency and resilience within situations of domestic abuse has been the focus of recent research, with an emphasis on children’s voices to inform knowledge. This has been underpinned by a move away from the witness model of domestic abuse. This article contributes to this growing understanding of how children react, respond, and interact when living with domestic abuse. Qualitative interviews were completed with 16 relevant professionals, and 13 adult survivors of childhood domestic abuse. The research overall was conducted through the lens of the home to provide enhanced insight into day-to-day experiences of domestic abuse. Factors associated with resilience were part of an initial research question, whereas agency emerged as a strong theme through the analysis process. This research has demonstrated that children engage in varying degrees of agency or display behaviours associated with resilience to cope with situations of domestic abuse, prevent or stop escalation of abuse or as protection for themselves and others. This article argues that agency and resilience can occur in contexts where adults – both inside and outside the home – have not prevented children from experiencing domestic abuse and its impacts. This has been conceptualised as children operating in the context of a ‘vacuum of responsibility’.
Article
Full-text available
• Summary: Domestic violence often directly and indirectly undermines the relationship between mothers and their children. This paper describes ‘the tactics of abuse’ that are instrumental in this damaging process and draws on previous research by one of the authors which shows that a conspiracy of silence can ensue, precluding talk of the abuse that women and children have experienced. The first stage of a four-year action research process designed to address some of these issues is discussed. • Findings: Early findings show that those women and children living in refuges or using outreach services who chose to work together on activities have found the process beneficial. They have provided critical feedback about how the project and activities can be revised for the second action research cycle. The research also shows that not all women are ready to engage in this process when they enter a refuge, and it does require them to acknowledge that their children have been exposed to, and negatively affected by, domestic violence. • Applications: The implications for social workers and specifically the need to provide active support for the mother-child relationship in the aftermath of domestic violence are discussed.
Book
Nordic countries are generally regarded as global welfare role models in terms of their image of being gender equal, child-friendly and culturally tolerant. Consequently, the influence of Nordic welfare systems in transnational academic and policy debates has been immense. By focusing on the vital welfare issue of violence by men to female partners and/or their children, this book seeks to reconsider this over-simplistic image.Drawing on new research from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, the book critically examines how men's violence in families is perceived and responded to in the Nordic context. It pays particular attention to the links between violence to women and violence to children, children's perspectives, professional discourses and responses, and legal and policy approaches.With clear links between research, policy and practice, the book is highly relevant to a wide audience, including academics, researchers and students in the fields of social work, health, criminology, sociology, social policy, gender studies, European studies and law. It is also recommended reading for welfare managers, practitioners, and policy makers. © 2005 Maria Eriksson, Marianne Hester, Suvi Keskinen and Keith Pringle.
Article
Studies of children's functioning following exposure to a traumatic event rarely have investigated change over the weeks following the event, but examining recovery in the short aftermath of a traumatic event is important for understanding vulnerability to subsequent disorder, as well as the potential utility of preventive interventions. Data are reported from a short-term longitudinal study of 35 mother-child dyads over 14 weeks following exposure to an incident of severe intimate partner violence. Using a developmental-ecological framework, we proposed that maternal parenting practices would be associated with children's recovery, and that maternal distress would be associated with her parenting practices. Consistent with hypotheses, observed parenting practices at baseline predicted the trajectory of children's self-reported internalizing problems over the study period. Maternal mental health problems were associated with child depression symptoms, but not with overall child internalizing symptoms. Parenting was not associated with maternal mental health symptoms. Further studies should pay closer attention to the role of parenting in children's adjustment in the aftermath of a traumatic event.
Book
Moving beyond the narrow clinical perspective sometimes applied to viewing the emotional and developmental risks to battered children, The Batterer as Parent: Addressing the Impact of Domestic Violence on Family Dynamics, Second Edition offers a view that takes into account the complex ways in which a batterer’s abusive and controlling behaviors are woven into the fabric of daily life. This book is a guide for therapists, child protective workers, family and juvenile court personnel, and other human service providers in addressing the complex impact that batterers—specifically, male batterers of a domestic partner when there are children in the household—have on family functioning. In addition to providing an understanding of batterers as parents and family members, the book also supplies clearly delineated approaches to such practice issues as assessing risk to children (including perpetrating incest), parenting issues in child custody and visitation evaluation, and impact on children's therapeutic process and family functioning in child protective practice.
Article
Based on interview data from 58 young adult children who experienced parental divorce, this study examines qualitative aspects of mother-child relationships and strengths in these relationships. Boundary issues and roles shifts between children and their divorced mothers are particularly emphasized. A content analysis revealed that often times, mothers were viewed as friends, especially by daughters, and their withdrawal from caregiving was generally welcomed. Implications of mothers' reliance on their children for emotional support are explored from the child's perspective. While such behavior has largely been pathologized in the clinical literature, this data suggests that mothers' leaning on children for emotional support and advice contributed to a sense of equality, closeness, and friend status. These qualities appeared to be valued by the participants in this study. Implications for family practitioners and scholars, as they relate to notions of boundary violation and adolescent development, are discussed from a family strengths perspective.
Article
Although concern for their children's well-being is pivotal in mothers' decisions to leave abusive partners, rarely is lone-parent family life after leaving framed as beneficial for family members' emotional health. In this feminist grounded theory study of family health promotion in the aftermath of intimate partner violence, we learned that families strengthen their emotional health by purposefully replacing previously destructive patterns of interaction with predictable, supportive ways of getting along in a process called regenerating family. These findings add to our knowledge of family development and how families promote their health when they have experienced intimate partner violence.