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Use of police services by victims of domestic violence
Abstract
The use of police services by 61 victims of domestic violence in an Omaha, Nebraska shelter was examined with a brief questionnaire. Over 70% of the sample was under 40 years old and white, almost 40% had some college education, and slightly over 30% of the sample was married. Questions regarding contact with and perceptions of the police found that subjects rated their recent experiences with the police as slightly more satisfactory than past experiences. The majority of subjects that recalled satisfactory experiences with the police gave interpersonal reasons for their satisfaction. One frequently offered reason for dissatisfaction was that the police did not provide subjects with information concerning their options. Although not statistically significant, several patterns reflected previous findings that lower socioeconomic victims were more likely to contact the police. There did not appear to be any support for the notion that a negative perception of the police would effect a victim's likelihood to contact the police or to seek shelter. Yet, women who had never called the police were (a) embarrassed by the incident(s) and felt the police will be of little, if any, assistance, and/or (b) felt domestic violence was a private matter, not something likely to be reported to the police. Results showed that the longer a victim had been abused the more likely that she would have sought assistance from lawyers and medical services. Statistically non-significant patterns indicated that those victims having contact with police were more likely to seek other sources of assistance. Limitations of the study and implications for future research and work with victims are discussed.
Subject Area
Social psychology|Families & family life|Personal relationships|Sociology|Public administration
Recommended Citation
Muraoka, Sandy Martinez, "Use of police services by victims of domestic violence" (1996). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9614995.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9614995