Properties of Domestic Violence Against Women and Related Cultural Contexts

Domestic violence can cause negative consequences for women’s mental and physical health. To plan a proper program to prevent and control this social issue, we need to know the nature of domestic violence and cultural themes that led to it. In this research information has been gathered through interviewing with battered women. Findings then got analyzed by thematic analysis method. As a result, main themes and sub themes got emerged. 31 women who had experience of domestic violence participated in this research and they have been chosen by purposeful sampling method. Women who suffered from domestic violence mentioned four characteristics for it. According to what they explained, domestic violence followed a cycle of specific phases and its severity increased gradually as marriage goes forward. Also, it is usually unavoidable for them and different types of violence are combined. Research findings also showed that there are two main cultural themes for violence against women; Patriarchy and inappropriate social attitudes. As a main theme patriarchy contains three sub themes of sexual socialization, depriving women from making decisions for their lives and internalizing oppression. Inappropriate attitude theme includes three sub themes. They are considering divorce as a social taboo, domestic violence as a private issue and tolerating domestic violence in any cost.