Answer

PREVENTION PROGRAMS THAT WORK BEST IN DECREASING DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AGAINST CALD WOMEN IN AUSTRALIA

Ghafournia, N. and Easteal, P., 2018. Are immigrant women visible in Australian domestic violence reports that potentially influence policy?. Laws, 7(4), pp.1-16.

Ghafournia and Easteal (2018) offer an honest review on the representation of immigrant women on the Australian domestic violence reports and policy formulation strategies. The authors use an intersectional research methodology approach to evaluate and examine government reports and documents for evidence of disparities and inequalities. The choice of reports and documents is based on age and their potential contribution to developing effective domestic violence prevention programs against culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) women.  A total of five policy-influencing reports are analyzed.

The study results show that even though the reports paid attention to the vulnerabilities and needs of the refugee and immigrant women, identifying unique domestic and family violence, they did not provide an in-depth understanding of the interaction between gender and other social constructs and their role on domestic violence. Additionally, the role of ethnicity, culture, race, immigration and social status, among other factors, in domestic violence against these women was not thoroughly discussed.

The key limitation of the study is that the reports minimizes diverse women’s experiences of domestic violence and could compromise policy formulation and development of adequate programs to combat domestic violence against CALD women. Moreover, a lack of knowledge on the role played by different factors such as ethnicity and race on women’s experiences on domestic violence would limit the understanding of their vulnerabilities and needs. Therefore, it is important to carry out a holistic, intersectional approach to understand domestic violence causes and experiences that would aid the development of appropriate policies and prevention programs. 

Sutherland, G., Easteal, P., Holland, K. and Vaughan, C., 2019. Mediated representations of violence against women in the mainstream news in Australia. BMC Public Health, 19(1), pp.1-8.

Sutherland  et al. (2019) explore the mediated representation of violence against women in the mainstream Australian media, paying attention to the nature of reporting, extent and frequency. The research methodology involves a descriptive and content analysis of media reports about domestic violence. The reports are derived from broadcast, newspapers, and online sites from three demographically diverse states: South Australia, New South Wales and Queensland, for four months. In total, 77 newspapers, 96 radio stations, and more than 50 TV broadcast news were analyzed during the four months.

The researchers establish that the coverage is extensive and that journalists and readers are always ready to engage on domestic violence-related topics. However, the main media streams fail to frequently discuss domestic violence from a broader social context perspective, to include information on how to obtain help or present possible actions to address the issue. The reports also suppress the voices of experts, advocates and survivors. The limitations of the research include restricting the samples to selected states and selected media outlets, thus not giving the bigger picture of the country. Additionally, television and radio reports are available as summary making it difficult to code and analyze the data.

The study recognizes the key role played by media reporting in measuring the progress of efforts directed towards addressing health and social challenges. Media being the voices of the public, needs to be active in matters of public interest. An inclusive participation of media in addressing domestic violence against CALD women would significantly push for legislative reforms to address the prevalent challenge.  

Vaughan, C., Jarallah, Y., Murdolo, A., Murray, L., Quiazon, R., Block, K. and Zannettino, L., 2019. The MuSeS project: a mixed-methods study to increase understanding of the role of settlement and multicultural services in supporting migrant and refugee women experiencing violence in Australia. BMC International Health and Human Rights, 19(1), pp.1-8.

Vaughan et al. (2019) addresses the existing knowledge gap and policy failure. They provide an inclusive understanding of how the refugee and migrant women experiencing domestic violence in Australia can be supported through settlement and multicultural services. This is a two-year mixed study research project in six communities across selected three states: Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania, to establish the migration and settlement patterns. Both qualitative and quantitative data regarding effective strategies that can better support women going through domestic violence were generated and analyzed. The study also includes an in-depth interview, online survey and focus group discussions.  

Results show that 37% of Australian women have experienced physical or sexual violence while one of six women have either experienced domestic violence with current or previous partners. The number is even higher for refugees and immigrant women who form part of the CALD women group. The high number is a point of concern to public and policymakers.  The study’s limitation is that it might not be inclusive as it focuses on only six communities derived from only three states.  Additionally, there were chances that the participants could have given false information that did not reflect the actual happenings. The findings also provided a better understanding of multicultural services and settlement in preventing violence against women. This would help develop effective and inclusive programs for supporting victims and decreasing domestic violence against CALD Australian women. 

Evaluative Analysis

Conducting this evidence-based inquiry exercise involve two critical steps. The first step involved performing a literature search to identify related research published within the last five years.  After identifying ten sources from different platforms such as BMC International Health and Huma Rights and Google Scholar, the articles were sorted based on relevancy to retain only three.  The main challenge of finding the relevant sources was that most available sources were published a decade ago and could not represent the actual up-to-date data on the subject. Moreover, most sources talked about diverse violence against women with no discussions on the causes or potential mitigation measures.

The three sources recognized the increasing trend and high domestic violence rate against Australian women, particularly the CALD women. The evidence proved useful in understanding the causes of domestic violence and women’s experiences from broader perspectives, including gender, ethnicity, race, and immigration status. The sources agreed that developing effective, inclusive, diverse and non-discriminative policies and programs would play a key role in addressing the worrying health problem by creating awareness and supporting the victims.

The knowledge would aid the development of appropriate preventive programs considering the vulnerabilities and needs of different women groups.  For instance, the media can be a watchdog in putting the government and stakeholders on the right track by frequently streaming domestic violence against women by engaging victims, survivors, and exerts to establish possible causes and solutions. In doing so, both governmental and non-governmental organizations would react by providing support. Based on the evidence, success in the fight against domestic violence is a mutual responsibility. It requires maximum support and input from the public, mainstream media, different stakeholders, and the government.