NCJ Number
104724
Date Published
1986
Length
16 pages
Annotation
Battered women syndrome (BWS) is a collection of specific characteristics and effects of abuse that results in the victim's decreased ability to respond effectively to the violence against her.
Abstract
Indicators of BWS include the traumatic effects of victimization such as distress, anxiety, re-experiencing the trauma in the form of nightmares, numbed responsiveness and reduced involvement with the world, heightened autonomic arousal, and sleep or cognitive disturbances. Additional indicators are learned helplessness deficits and the development of self-destructive coping responses that paradoxically help the battered woman to minimize or endure the impact of violence, but at great cost to her mental and physical health. An additive, three-phase model of intervention is useful in the treatment of BWS. The first phase involves crisis intervention to increase the victim's personal safety and to effect psychological stabilization. The second, decisionmaking phase of intervention focuses on an analysis of the costs and benefits of remaining in the relationship or leaving it. In the final restructuring phase, emphasis is on increasing the victim's self-efficacy and behavioral competence, reducing anxiety symptoms, developing more adaptive responses to stress, increasing economic independence, and restructuring sex-role expectations and norms concerning wife abuse. 20 references.