Archives

Physical health conditions and intimate partner violence: A gendered issue

    Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a widespread global public health issue with serious and long-lasting consequences. While much research has focused on the mental health consequences of IPV, such as depression and PTSD, there is limited evidence on its association with physical health.

    This study explored how different types and number of types of IPV are linked to specific physical health conditions, and whether these associations differ between men and women. VISION researchers Dr Ladan Hashemi, Dr Anastasia Fadeeva and Professor Sally McManus, with Nadia Khan, City St George’s UoL, examined this using data from the 2014 Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey.

    Key findings include:

    • Women were more likely to experience IPV and a higher number of IPV types than men.
    • Women’s experience of lifetime and 12-month IPV were significantly associated with 12 and 11 different physical health conditions, respectively, while men’s experience of lifetime and 12-month IPV were significantly associated with 4 and 1 conditions, respectively.
    • Different types of IPV types were associated with different types of physical health condition, particularly among women.
    • A cumulative association between experiencing a greater number of IPV types and an increased risk of physical health conditions was evident for women but not for men.

    The research concludes that IPV is a gendered issue, with stronger associations between IPV and physical health evident in this data for women than for men. This may be because women are more likely to experience more and multiple types of IPV, more frequently, and more often with injury. Healthcare systems must recognise IPV as a priority issue, ensuring support is tailored to those affected.

    Recommendation

    • Healthcare systems need to address IPV as a priority health issue for the female population. Gender-informed approaches in IPV intervention strategies and healthcare provision are required. This means emphasising the development of IPV-responsive healthcare systems and comprehensive IPV curricula in medical and health training.

    To download the paper: Intimate partner violence and physical health in England: Gender stratified analyses of a probability sample survey – Ladan Hashemi, Anastasia Fadeeva, Nadia Khan, Sally McManus, 2025

    To cite: Hashemi L, Fadeeva A, Khan N, McManus S. Intimate partner violence and physical health in England: Gender stratified analyses of a probability sample survey. Women’s Health. 2025;21. doi:10.1177/17455057251326419

    For further information, please contact Ladan at ladan.hashemi@citystgeorges.ac.uk

    Illustration from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

    Synthetic datasets enable linkage and a longitudinal understanding of experiences of violence and health impacts and consequences

      Violence is a complex social problem and a public health issue, with implications for the health and social care systems, police and justice systems, as well as significant productivity losses for those who experience it. Analysing data collected by these systems can aid understanding of the problem of violence and how to respond to it. In social research, analysing administrative records together with survey data has already enabled better measurements of violence and its costs, capturing experiences of both victim-survivors and perpetrators across multiple points in time and social and economic domains.

      Ideally, data from the same individuals would enable linkage and a longitudinal understanding of experiences of violence and their (health) impacts and consequences. However, most studies in violence-related research analyse data in silo due to difficulties in accessing data and concerns for the safety of those exposed. This is particularly the case for data from third sector specialist support services for victims or perpetrators of violence which has, to VISION’s knowledge, not been linked or combined with other datasets. Because these services provide person-centred trauma-informed care and there is a risk that information on their service users may be used against them in courts or by immigration authorities, direct data linkage is not possible and alternatives are needed.

      With this research, VISION researchers Dr Estela Capelas Barbosa, Dr Niels Blom, and Dr Annie Bunce provide a proof-of-concept synthetic dataset by combining data from the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) and administrative data from Rape Crisis England and Wales (RCEW), pertaining to victim-survivors of sexual violence in adulthood. Intuitively, the idea was to impute missing information from one dataset by borrowing the distribution from the other.

      The researchers borrowed information from CSEW to impute missing data in the RCEW administrative dataset, creating a combined synthetic RCEW-CSEW dataset. Using look-alike modelling principles, they provide an innovative and cost-effective approach to exploring patterns and associations in violence-related research in a multi-sectorial setting.

      Methodologically, they approached data integration as a missing data problem to create a synthetic combined dataset. Multiple imputation with chained equations were employed to collate/impute data from the two different sources. To test whether this procedure was effective, they compared regression analyses for the individual and combined synthetic datasets for a variety of variables.

      Results show that the effect sizes for the combined dataset reflect those from the dataset used for imputation. The variance is higher, resulting in fewer statistically significant estimates. VISION’s approach reinforces the possibility of combining administrative with survey datasets using look-alike methods to overcome existing barriers to data linkage.

      Recommendations

      • Imputing missing information from one dataset by borrowing the distribution from the other should be applicable for costing exercises as it permits micro-costing. 
      • Compared to traditional research, VISION’s proposed approach to data integration offers a cost-effective solution to breaking (data-related) silos in research.

      To download the paper: Look-alike modelling in violence-related research: A missing data approach | PLOS One

      To cite: Barbosa EC, Blom N, Bunce A (2025) Look-alike modelling in violence-related research: A missing data approach. PLoS ONE 20(1): e0301155. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0301155

      For further information, please contact Estela at e.capelasbarbosa@bristol.ac.uk

      Illustration from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

      Call for Frontiers in Sociology abstracts: Enhancing data collection and integration to Reduce health harms and inequalities linked to violence

        Frontiers in Sociology is currently welcoming submissions of original research for the following research topic: Enhancing Data Collection and Integration to Reduce Health Harms and Inequalities Linked to Violence.

        This edition is guest-edited by Dr Estela Capelas Barbosa (University of Bristol and the UKPRP VISION research consortium), Dr Annie Bunce (City St. George’s, UoL and the UKPRP VISION research consortium), and Katie Smith (City St. George’s, UoL / University of Bristol).

        Submissions should focus on any of the following:

        • advancing measurement approaches which emphasise cross-sector harmonisation to better evaluate interventions, address health inequalities, and reduce violence
        • addressing any form of violence (e.g., physical, non-physical, technology-facilitated) and its impacts on health, social and economic well-being, and marginalised groups, considering intersections of age, gender, ethnicity, disability, and religion

        Research using existing datasets or primary data (quantitative or qualitative), cross-sectoral and cross-disciplinary approaches (e.g., sociology, criminology, public health), and lived experience perspectives is encouraged.

        Contributions may include conceptual reviews, methodological innovations, empirical studies and systematic reviews on themes such as health inequalities, intervention effectiveness, outcome measurement, data harmonisation, and linkage strategies.

        Abstracts are due by 7th April 2025, and the deadline for manuscripts is 28th July 2025.

        For details of the different article types accepted and associated costs, please follow this link https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sociology/for-authors/publishing-fees.

        For more information and to submit an abstract or manuscript, please use the “I’m interested” link below or visit the Research Topic page here https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/67291/enhancing-data-collection-and-integration-to-reduce-health-harms-and-inequalities-linked-to-violence. 

        This special edition provides an excellent opportunity to advance knowledge in this critical area. Please do reach out and contact us if you have any questions: annie.bunce@city.ac.uk

        Photo from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

        Upcoming event: Weaving Stories of Peer Sexual Abuse 

          Insights from a youth co-created animation project

          Weaving Stories is a pilot animation project developed by County-Durham arts education company, Changing Relations, and funded via the VISION research consortium through the Small Projects Fund.

          The animation was co-produced with Secondary-aged students, survivors of peer sexual abuse, and an artistic team, to amplify young people’s voices on the theme of unwanted sexual behaviour and the culture that enables it. The students and young survivors shaped every aspect of the animation.

          An interdisciplinary Steering Group of academic researchers, creative practitioners, and child protection and sexual violence specialists from a North East school and Rape Crisis centre, were also involved in the project.

          With this animation and associated school based learning programme, Changing Relations seeks to influence knowledge, behaviour, and institutional change using the impactful animation as stimulus for reflection. Following this pilot project, VISION and Changing Relations have organised a one-hour webinar for UK policymakers and practitioners to:

          • Watch the co-created animation (20 minutes)
          • Hear young people’s perspectives on the key themes and co-production approach
          • Explore the animation’s potential impact on school cultures, disclosure, help-seeking, and victim-blaming attitudes
          • Engage in academic-informed analysis of trauma-informed safeguarding and youth-centred approaches to sexual violence prevention
          • Gain practical insights on using creative participatory approaches to engage young people in conversations about violence and abuse
          • Consider actionable recommendations for policy and practice
          • Contribute your reflections

          This webinar will be of interest to a wide range of professionals who work with adolescents and / or in violence-prevention. Educators, social workers, academics, and third sector, central and local government policy analysts and researchers in particular may be interested.

          There are two dates providing the option to choose between a more practice or policy oriented session:

          • Thursday 8th May 1-2pm for policymakers
          • Wednesday 14th May 3-4pm for practitioners

          Speakers and facilitators

          • Lisa Davis, Managing Director, Changing Relations
          • Kate Gorman, Creative Producer and Artistic Director, Changing Relations
          • Kimberly Cullen, Knowledge Exchange Manager, UKPRP VISION research consortium, City St George’s UoL

          Webinar registration

          To register for free for either the 8th or 14th of May, please visit our page on Ticket Tailor.

          The webinar will be on Microsoft Teams and you will receive the link on the day you choose to attend.

          For further information, please contact VISION_Management_Team@citystgeorges.ac.uk

          United to End Violence Against Women and Girls: An Online Animated Campaign  

            Violence against women and girls (VAWG) is a pressing issue in Iran, a Middle Eastern country marked by its patriarchal structure and systematic and pervasive gender discrimination. Educational programmes addressing this issue are scarce, and cultural barriers often hinder open discussion. The United to End Violence Against Women and Girls campaign aims to break this silence through a series of animated videos in Farsi and English and images designed to inform public discourse and to empower victims to seek support.

             The United to End Violence Against Women and Girls project was led by VISION researchers Ladan Hashemi and Sally McManus, in collaboration with colleagues from other UK universities including the University of Bristol, Goldsmiths University, Animation Research Centre at the University for the Creative Arts, and Leeds Beckett University. 

            They worked with an animation production team in Iran, a social media advisor, and two advisory groups. The advisory groups were Mehre Shams Afarid, an Iran-based non-governmental organisation (NGO), and IKWRO, a London-based charity providing services to women victims of violence from the Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) region—to incorporate culturally specific insights.

            Although the project initially focused on Iran, engaging with the UK-based NGO revealed an interest in extending its reach. As a result, English subtitles were added to make the animations accessible to a wider audience. This collaboration helped the content resonate with audiences both in Iran and within the global diaspora community, particularly those from the MENA region.

            The animations are grounded in evidence from a survey of 453 women in Iran, which explored the manifestation of various forms of VAWG in Iran and women’s perspectives on how to eliminate it. The survey was designed by Fatima Babakhani, CEO of Mehre Shams Afarid.

            Key findings from participants’ open-ended responses to the survey showed that, despite structural inequalities and deeply ingrained societal, cultural, and religious norms that perpetuate VAWG, change is possible through education and legal reforms.

            As one survey participant noted: “Unfortunately, many still don’t understand what violence truly is. Raising awareness is the solution.”

            The first four United to End Violence Against Women and Girls campaign animations focus on coercive control, economic abuse, technology-facilitated abuse, and active bystander interventions, with two more animations in development.

            With guidance from an Iranian social media advisor, a digital strategy was developed to maximise the campaign’s impact. Instagram was chosen as the primary distribution platform, as it is the most widely used social media platform in Iran, with over 47 million users. The animations are also shared on YouTube to further extend the campaign’s reach.

            Influencers and women’s rights activists with followings from thousands to millions were partnered with to amplify the campaign’s reach. The online campaign officially launched 25th November, on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls.

            By leveraging evidence-based content and strategic partnerships, we hope to spark meaningful conversations and drive change across Iran and the diaspora communities from the MENA region.

            Join us in raising awareness and advocating for change. Please follow and share the campaign links on your social media to help spread the message.

            Link to Instagram page

            Link to YouTube channel

            This project was funded by City St George’s, University of London Higher Education Impact Fund (HEIF) Knowledge Exchange and by the UKPRP VISION research consortium.

            For further information, please contact Ladan at ladan.hashemi@city.ac.uk

            VISION responds to Parliamentary, government & non-government consultations

              Consultation, evidence and inquiry submissions are an important part of our work at VISION. Responding to Parliamentary, government and non-government organisation consultations ensures that a wide range of opinions and voices are factored into the policy decision making process. As our interdisciplinary research addresses violence and how it cuts across health, crime and justice and the life course, we think it is important to take the time to answer any relevant call and to share our insight and findings to support improved policy and practice. We respond as VISION, the Violence & Society Centre, and sometimes in collaboration with others. Below are the links to our published responses and evidence from June 2022.

              1. UK Parliament – Women and Equalities Committee – Inquiry: Community Cohesion. Our submission was published in February 2025.
              2. UK Parliament – Call for evidence on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill. Our submission was published in February 2025.
              3. UK Parliament – Public Accounts Committee – Inquiry: Use of Artificial Intelligence in Government. Our submission was published in January 2025.
              4. UK Parliament – Public Accounts Committee – Inquiry: Tackling Homelessness. Our submission with Dr Natasha Chilman was published in January 2025. See the full report
              5. Home Office – Legislation consultation: Statutory Guidance for the Conduct of Domestic Homicide Reviews. Our submission was published on the VISION website in July 2024.
              6. UK Parliament – Women and Equalities Committee – Inquiry: The rights of older people. Our submission was published in November 2023
              7. UK Parliament  – Women and Equalities Committee – Inquiry: The impact of the rising cost of living on women. Our submission was published in November 2023
              8. UK Parliament – Women and Equalities Committee – Inquiry: The escalation of violence against women and girls. Our submission published in September 2023
              9. Home Office – Legislation consultation: Machetes and other bladed articles: proposed legislation (submitted response 06/06/2023). Government response to consultation and summary of public responses was published in August 2023
              10. Welsh Government – Consultation: National action plan to prevent the abuse of older people. Summary of the responses published in April 2023
              11. Race Disparity Unit (RDU) – Consultation: Standards for Ethnicity Data (submitted response 30/08/2022). Following the consultation, a revised version of the data standards was published in April 2023
              12. UK Parliament – The Home Affairs Committee – Call for evidence: Human Trafficking. Our submission was published in March 2023
              13. UN expert – Call for evidence: Violence, abuse and neglect in older people. Our submission was published in February 2023
              14. UK Parliament – The Justice and Home Affairs Committee – Inquiry: Family migration. Our submission was published in September 2022 and a report was published following the inquiry in February 2023
              15. Home Office – Consultation: Controlling or Coercive behaviour Statutory Guidance. Our submission was published in June 2022

              For further information, please contact us at VISION_Management_Team@city.ac.uk

              Photo by JaRiRiyawat from Adobe Stock downloads (licensed)

              Implications of changing domestic abuse measurement on the Crime Survey for England & Wales

                The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is making a major decision this month on the future of Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) Domestic abuse measurement and monitoring.

                Last year, ONS ran an experiment where half of the CSEW sample got the domestic abuse module used since 2005, and the other half got a new module that is not comparable with the previous one. ONS intend to move over entirely to the new module in the next data collection (2025/26).

                Loss of the existing module has major implications: it is world-leading, uses globally comparable items, and with trend data going back to 2005. Without consistently administered core items from that module, it will no longer be possible to:

                • Produce long-term trends over time in domestic abuse for England and Wales.
                • Group a decade of survey years together to have enough cases to robustly examine domestic abuse in particular regions, minoritised groups, and by other protected characteristics for many years. This is essential for understanding inequalities in violence and subsequent service contact, and whether these are changing.

                The new module is problematic for many reasons:

                • Is not a standardised measure, has undergone little validation or psychometric testing, and is not comparable with anything used previously or in any other country or study.  
                • It separates data collection between former and current partner based on relationship status at the time of the interview, not at the time of abuse. This distinction creates confusion for interpretation of analysis and may be misinterpreted. The distinction is also problematic for classification of casual and other relationship types.
                • The overhaul of the module was intended to align measurement with the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 definition, but it appears that domestic abuse as recognised by that Act cannot be identified by this module.

                We urgently recommend that before losing this world-leading time series and relying on an untested, not comparable, and flawed new approach to DA measurement in England and Wales, that ONS:

                1. Pause: continue the split-sample data collection for one more year.
                2. Test the new approach: fully compare data collected using the new and old modules data so the validity and utility of the new measures can be evaluated appropriately, and its impact on inequalities assessed.
                3. Publish these results publicly: and fully consult once stakeholders understand all the implications of having data collected in each way before the decision to roll out new data collection is finalised.
                4. With this information, then compare all options: such as maintaining some of the existing questions alongside adding new coercive control items. This straightforward approach would ensure the utility of the survey for national trends (in both England and Wales) and analysis of inequalities and minoritised groups, while also improving the measurement of coercive control.

                We urge others who feel similarly to contact ONS at CrimeStatistics@ons.gov.uk  or contact us at VISION_Management_Team@city.ac.uk if you would like to discuss.

                Note that ONS is planning a raft of further changes with similar implications for trends and analysis of minoritised groups, including:

                • Removal of the sexual victimisation module from next data collection (2025/26), with redevelopment at some future date.
                • Removal and redevelopment of the nature of partner abuse questions, which cover DA survivors service use and police contact and are essential to understanding whether some groups are underserved by services.

                These will further undermine continuity of data for trends and the ability to analyse minoritised groups or by protected characteristics.

                For researchers interested in combining CSEW waves to enable robust analysis of inequalities by protected characteristics and for minoritised groups, VISION researcher Niels Blom has published syntax: https://vision.city.ac.uk/news/new-possibilities-created-by-crime-survey-wave-integration/.

                Photo from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

                VISION researcher, Lizzie Cook, speaks at Dutch Embassy Just Talk(s) event on femicide

                  On 10 December 2024, celebrated globally as Human Rights Day and the final day of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-based Violence campaign, the Dutch Embassy in London organised a panel discussion on femicide and the criminalisation of violence against women and girls.

                  Lizzie Cook was invited to speak as part of the event which was opened by the Dutch Ambassador Paul Huijts and Liaison Magistrate Wendela Mulder, and moderated by Lotte Wildeboer. The afternoon consisted of talks by Professor Sandra Walklate (of the VISION Advisory Board), Judith van Schoonderwoerd den Bezemer-Wolters (Dutch Public Prosecutor for Domestic and Sexual Violence), Katie Hoeger and Angela Whitaker (VKPP and College of Policing), and Janine Janssen (Dutch Police Academy). The event was part of a series of Just Talk(s) organised by the Dutch Embassy which seek to foster dialogue and exchange ideas on particular issues.

                  The panel addressed a range of themes including challenges in current definitions of femicide, the implications for data and measurement, and what this means for prevention.

                  To read more about some of the themes discussed in this panel, do take a look at Lizzie, Sandra and Kate Fitz-Gibbon’s 2023 special subsection of Current Sociology: Re-imagining what counts as femicide which brings together contributions on femicide from the UK, South Africa and Latin America.

                  Photograph from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

                  Natural Language Processing: Interrogating free text in mental healthcare records to capture experiences of violence

                    Violence can be categorised in a variety of ways for example physical, sexual, emotional, and domestic but all cause significant physical and mental morbidity within general populations. Individuals with a severe mental illness have been found to be significantly more likely to experience domestic, physical, and sexual violence compared to the general population. For these individuals, experiences of violence are important risk factors however, this is not routinely collected by mental health services.

                    In general data on all forms of violence has been inadequately available from healthcare records. This is partly due to the lack of routine enquiry by professionals at points of clinical contact, and partly because instances of violence are difficult to identify in healthcare data in the absence of specific coding systems.

                    A general challenge for using health records data for research is that the most valuable and granular information is frequently contained in text fields (e.g., routine case notes, clinical correspondence) rather than in pre-structured fields; this includes mentions of violence whether experienced as a victim or perpetrated. Capturing violence experiences across mental healthcare settings can be challenging because most instances are likely to be recorded as unstructured text data. Therefore, natural language processing (NLP), is increasingly in use to extract information automatically from unstructured text in electronic health records, particularly in mental healthcare, on clinical entities.

                    Dr Ava Mason from Kings College London and VISION researchers Professor Robert Stewart, Dr Angus Roberts, Dr Lifang Li, and Dr Vishal Bhavsar worked with colleagues to apply NLP across different clinical samples to investigate mentions of violence. They ascertained recorded violence victimisation from the records of 60,021 patients receiving care from a large south London NHS mental healthcare provider during 2019. Descriptive and regression analyses were conducted to investigate variation by age, sex, ethnic group, and diagnostic category.

                    Results showed that patients with a mood disorder, personality disorder, schizophrenia spectrum disorder or PTSD had a significantly increased likelihood of victimisation compared to those with other mental health diagnoses. Additionally, patients from minority ethnic groups for Black and Asian had significantly higher likelihood of recorded violence victimisation compared to White groups. Males were significantly less likely to have reported recorded violence victimisation than females.

                    The researchers demonstrated the successful deployment of machine learning based NLP algorithms to ascertain important entities for outcome prediction in mental healthcare. The observed distributions highlight which sex, ethnicity and diagnostic groups had more records of violence victimisation. Further development of these algorithms could usefully capture broader experiences, such as differentiating more efficiently between witnessed, perpetrated and experienced violence and broader violence experiences like emotional abuse.

                    To download the paper: Frontiers | Applying neural network algorithms to ascertain reported experiences of violence in routine mental healthcare records and distributions of reports by diagnosis

                    To cite: Mason AJC, Bhavsar V, Botelle R, Chandran D, Li L, Mascio A, Sanyal J, Kadra-Scalzo G, Roberts A, Williams M, Stewart R. Applying neural network algorithms to ascertain reported experiences of violence in routine mental healthcare records and distributions of reports by diagnosis. Frontiers in Psychiatry 2024 Sep 10. doi:103389/fpsyt.2024.1181739

                    Illustration from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

                    Centring otherness with migrant women affected by domestic abuse

                      Victims-survivors with insecure immigration status in the UK are subject to complexities that limit their access to safety, support, and justice. While campaigners have been advocating for more equitable pathways for provision and support over the years, migrant women continue to navigate hostile environments characterised by dehumanising language and anti-migrant bureaucratic systems.

                      This chapter, written by VISION researcher Dr Olumide Adisa for the book, Otherness in Communication Research: Perspectives in Media, Interpersonal, and Intercultural Communication, reports on how a feminist dialogic approach (characterised by open, inclusive dialogue and a foundational understanding of social, economic, and political equality for women) was used to centre the often ‘silent voices’ of migrant women affected by domestic abuse.

                      Feminist dialogical approach acknowledges the complexities that characterise the migrant victim’s journey through the system—the relationship between the self-other, in a peculiar hostile environment which views the other as a ‘threat’. Migrant women continue to endure this othering within agencies as they seek safety and support. For example, some professionals conflating ‘foreignness’ with ‘insecure immigration statuses’, when confronted with difference. This theorisation of self and other lends itself to a social justice-oriented practice.

                      Using different art forms (co-produced with migrant women) and purposeful conversations, attendees were able to encounter migrant women as not a distant ‘other’ whom ‘we’ observe and theorise but as equal partners in the creating and reshaping on knowledge systems on safety, support, and justice.

                      This chapter draws on quotes from survivors to funnel through a hopeful lingering over otherness that positions migrant women as deserving of consideration and care, and considers empowering aspects about the other that may often be dismissed in professional circles, but nonetheless are important as a protective element of a safety net.

                      To download the chapter: Centring Otherness with Migrant Women Affected by Domestic Abuse | SpringerLink

                      To cite: Adisa, O. (2025). Centring Otherness with Migrant Women Affected by Domestic Abuse. In: Magalhaes, L. (eds) Otherness in Communication Research. Palgrave Studies in Otherness and Communication. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-73788-6_16

                      For further information, please contact Olumide at olumide.adisa@city.ac.uk

                      Illustration from Adobe Photo Stock subscription