Accounting for Intimate Partner Violence: A Biographical Analysis of Narrative Strategies Used by Men Experiencing IPV from Their Female Partners

Abstract

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a serious social issue which affects the medium- and long-term health outcomes of many individuals worldwide. The cost of IPV on the physical and psychological well-being of individuals, in addition to its wider economic costs in responding to abused persons, is significant. Presently, there is a lack of understanding about the nature of female-initiated IPV and how men account for their experiences of it. This study examined male victims’ life stories of their IPV experiences from their intimate partners. Using the biographical narrative interpretive method, three cases were analyzed from a social constructionist perspective to examine what narrative strategies men used to account for their experiences of being abused by their female partners. Three dominant narrative strategies were used by respondents: the fatherhood narrative, the good husband narrative, and the abuse narrative. The abuse narrative had a unique narrative form, which reflected respondents’ disassociation between their identities as men and also as abused persons. Dominant conflicting discourses of masculinity and intimate partner abuse disadvantaged men in identifying IPV and secondly in responding appropriately. This study found that men prefer to use dominant discursive identities as legitimate means from which to disclose IPV experiences. The findings from this study illustrate that broad questioning by professionals regarding fatherhood may be most helpful in promoting disclosures of IPV if this is suspected.