Intimate Partner Violence Theory

Intimate partner violence affects 1 in 3 women in the United States with 3 in 10 having experienced rape, physical violence, and/or stalking by an intimate partner (Black et al., 2011). Intimate partner violence occurs across all racial diversities increasing in those of multiracial affiliations. Women continue to be the highest targeted group against which intimate partner violence is perpetrated. Propelling the abuse between intimates are inhibited socioeconomic achievements which is further expounded upon by social strain theorists who posits that both internal and external stressors can create intense emotions that propel innovative deviant behavioral patterns that further rejects the accepted institutionalized means to achieve those goals
In enduring such control and abuse leveraged against them, women continue to remain in relationships with violent and often deadly men due to the fear of an intense escalation of violence if they choose to leave. The rationalization of abusive behaviors perpetrated by the husband, boyfriend, family member, or intimate partner on the victim and acceptance of those behaviors as normative drives the position that rational choice theorists posit that women weigh the options of leaving the relationship versus remaining. In reaching a rational choice to leave or stay in the relationship women strategically examine socioeconomic, emotional, psychological, and familial factors weighing each against the potential escalation of violence (Meyer, S. 2012). Comprehension of the intergenerational transmission of violence that occurs with victimization both directly and indirectly seemingly evaporates in comparison to the maternal drive to protect thereby enabling the abuser to continue the cycle of violence and necessitating the choice to remain in the