Help-seeking behavior among same-sex intimate partner violence victims: an intersectional argument

Few studies have examined the barriers that lesbian and gay male IPV victims face when attempting to access social services which has resulted in an area of theorizing that remains underdeveloped. The paucity of research on this topic is problematic, as extant inquiry indicates that these victims en...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Parry, Megan M. (Author)
Contributors: O'Neal, Eryn Nicole
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Published: 2015
In: Criminology, criminal justice, law & society
Year: 2015, Volume: 16, Issue: 1, Pages: 51-67
Online Access: Volltext (kostenfrei)
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Keywords:
Barriers to service
Gay,
Intersectionality
Intimate partner violence
Lesbian
Same-sex
Description
Summary:Few studies have examined the barriers that lesbian and gay male IPV victims face when attempting to access social services which has resulted in an area of theorizing that remains underdeveloped. The paucity of research on this topic is problematic, as extant inquiry indicates that these victims encounter several barriers when engaging in help-seeking. Moreover, a small number of studies have used intersectional thinking to guide analyses of IPV help-seeking behavior in the lesbian and gay community. The current theoretical paper identifies the barriers that lesbian and gay IPV victims encounter when attempting to access socialservices because prior work has failed to synthesize what is known about their experiences using an intersectional approach. We identify help-seeking obstacles that are specific—and often unique—to lesbian and gay IPV victims with the goal of providing synthesized information useful for future research and theory development. In the first section, we discuss relationship barriers (e.g. threats of outing). Section II describes structural and institutional barriers (e.g., gender norms, minority stress). In Section III we examine legal barriers (e.g., justice system, anti-homosexual beliefs). The last section offers recommendations for practitioners and future research based on prior literature.
ISSN:2332-886X