One of the most serious workplace challenges that increasingly concerns employee assistance professionals is domestic violence and its impact on the workplace. But EAPs who work with abused or abusing employees are also becoming more and more aware of the effect of domestic violence on the children of employees.

What is Domestic Violence?
When we talk about domestic violence, just what are we really talking about? S. A. Eisenstat and L. Bancroft writing in The New England Journal of Medicine offer this definition: "Domestic abuse, or battering, is a pattern of psychological, economic and sexual coercion of one partner in a relationship by the other that is punctuated by physical assaults or threats of bodily harm." A new study on domestic violence and children by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation defines it as violence that occurs between adult intimate partners.

Ninety percent of partner violence involves women being abused by men. But domestic violence is also perpetuated against women and men in same-sex relationships and by women against men. Older adults are also victims of domestic violence, with more cases of abuse against elderly women being reported. There is a definite relationship between partner violence and child abuse. It is estimated that between 50 and 70 percent of the mothers of abused children are also abused by their partners.

Indirect Harm
Many other children escape direct physical harm but are exposed to domestic violence -- between 3.3 million and 10 million children each year, according to one estimate. This exposure can have significant negative effects on the child's emotional, social and cognitive development. These effects may include:

• aggressive behavior and other conduct problems
• impaired school performance, concentration and learning
• depression and anxiety, sleep and appetite disturbance
• lower levels of social competence and self-esteem
• symptoms consistent with post-traumatic stress, such as emotional numbing, increased arousal and repeated focus on the violent event

Continuing the Cycle
In some cases, exposure to domestic violence can also condition children to believe that abuse is a normal part of family life. These children may grow up to repeat their parents' behavior. A 1999 study by the Metropolitan Phoenix Domestic Violence Research Group found, for example, that over one-half of participating women had witnessed abuse between their parents, and over 30 percent were themselves abused as children.

The study also found that none of the children who were exposed to domestic violence in their homes were receiving any professional counseling or support to help them deal with the trauma.

The Optum^® Study
Optum is a program that provides comprehensive information, education and support services to help employees enhance their quality of life through improved health and well-being. Through multiple integrated access points (the telephone, audiotapes, print materials, in-person consultations and the Internet) Optum helps participants address daily living concerns, make appropriate health care decisions, and become more effective managers of their own health and well-being.

In a study of abuse cases reported to Optum Assistance by telephone from June 1991 through December 1994, Optum researchers counted a total of 2,627 clients with a "domestic abuse/violent relationship/child abuse" problem type either as the primary or secondary assessed problem type. This represents 3.7 percent of all new cases in this period, or about one of every 20 cases.

To put it another way: If approximately 4 percent of all employees use an employee assistance program during a given year, and 3.7 percent of that user group reports domestic abuse, then about one in every 675 employees is reporting domestic violence—and probably many more are actually experiencing it.

Researchers noted that 49 percent of these callers (and 78 percent of female callers) were adults who had experienced abuse as children. Thirty-one percent of callers were adults concerned about children under age 18 who were being abused.

The Most Dangerous Months
On average, August and September were the months of the year when the most abuse cases were called into Optum counselors. The month with the fewest abuse calls was June.

Optum researchers speculate there might be tension and family stress around the beginning of the academic school year including the financial strain of purchasing new clothes and books, difficulties in getting children up and ready for school, readjusting daily and work schedules, and the end-of-summer heat.

Abuse of Pets Indicates Abuse of People
According to a recent article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, pet abuse is usually a warning sign that there currently is or will be abuse of family members. Animals are frequent targets in domestic violence situations. For example, abused children sometimes take out their frustration on a house pet, and adults might maim or kill a family pet in order to gain control over a spouse or child. In one study of battered women, 57 percent of those with pets said their partners harmed or killed animals, and one in four said they stayed with a batterer because they feared leaving a pet behind.

As a result of these findings, some Humane Societies have begun setting up "safe houses" for pets so that abused spouses and children can seek emergency shelter without endangering animals left behind in the home. A new Florida bill would require child-abuse investigators to report cruelty to pets, and animal control officers to report suspicions of domestic violence in families.

Portable Guides to Investigating Child Abuse
The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention has developed an award-winning series of 13 "Portable Guides" to provide guidelines for investigating child abuse and neglect in a practical, easy-to-use format. The guides use straightforward, uncomplicated language, bulleted lists, tables, charts, checklists and sample forms to present information useful to law enforcement, social workers, prosecutors and other professionals.

For more information, contact OJJDP's Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse by telephone at (800) 638-8736. Nine of the guides may be downloaded from the OJJDP Web site.

By Marcie Parker, Ph.D., C.F.L.E., Senior Qualitative Researcher; R. Edward Bergmark, Ph.D., President and CEO; Mark Attridge, Ph.D., Research Manager, all with Optum, Golden Valley, Minn.; and Jude Miller-Burke, Ph.D., Organizational Consultant, Minneapolis, and Phoenix, Ariz.

Reprinted with permission from Report. Newsletter of the National Council on Family Relations 45:4 (December 2000): F6-F7.

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