Violence During Pregnancy and the Postpartum Period

VAWnet is a project of the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. “Violence during pregnancy is a critical concern because it is often frequent and severe in nature. Pregnant abused women tend to report experiencing more severe violence compared to non-pregnant abused women (Campbell, Oliver, & Bullock, 1993; McFarlane, Parker, & Soeken, 1995). In addition, pregnant violence survivors often experience multiple violent incidents during pregnancy (Amaro, Fried, Cabral, & Zuckerman, 1990; Martin et al., 2004). Moreover, some (but not all) women violated both before and during pregnancy experience increases in the severity or frequency of violence during pregnancy (Karmaliani et al., 2008; Macy, Martin, Kupper, Casanueva, & Guo, 2007; Taillieu & Brownridge, 2010).” Violence against women is a global problem which exacts a high burden of suffering on millions of women and families, including women who are pregnant and postpartum.1 This review will present some research findings concerning violence against pregnant and postpartum women, discuss some of the strengths and limitations of these studies, and conclude with comments concerning the implications of this work for practice and research.