Does Quoting Statistics On Relationship Violence Produce Any Change In Behaviour ...?

Question: Does quoting statistics on relationship violence produce any change in the behaviour or in the culture that supports it? Statistics like a study by Access Economics that domestic violence costs Australia $8.1 billion in the year 2002-03 economy-wide. That it is ranked in the top five risks to women's health in Australia, responsible for more ill-health and premature death in Australian women than high cholesterol, illicit drugs or unsafe sex and is a greater cause of death and disability in women under 45 than smoking or obesity. Half of the cost is borne by the victims of violence, which also includes the children, so where does that much money come from or is it just earnings foregone due to injury, disability and lost days at work? It can't be from funding real social programs rather than just another advertising campaign.

Answer (1) The public is constantly bombarded through the media as "info-tainment" with a litany of gloom, doom, disaster and mayhem. Most people build up a certain tolerance for this, as a defense against being overwhelmed by the enormity of what we hear and see and the resultant feelings of personal impotence. We develop a certain protective insularity and self-centredness. We listen to statistics, tut tut, shake our heads and then, get on with our lives, because we have no choice. I agree with you inasmuch as simply advertising and making people aware of disturbing statistics, rarely does anything else other than produce a momentary disturbance. Certainly, change in culture and behaviour does not happen overnight. There is little comfort for women being currently abused in the realisation that social behaviours and the attitudes that drive them, change slowly and gradually. They must be chipped away at relentlessly over time but they do reduce and with luck, some eventually become extinguished.

Answer provided by David White, Psychotherapist

Answer (2) Statistics may contribute to the offenders sense that they are not alone in their behaviour so they are not uniquely "evil" or "crazed". Their greater use is to bring home to the larger community the fact of the prevalence of this hugely damaging phenomenon. Relationship violence can be removed from a relationship if the offender can come to see the pain he or she causes and if they can be shown alternative ways to resolve emotional differences. None of this is an easy process but with suitable training and therapy, it can happen. Economic statistics, I imagine, are an attempt to translate the harms of family violence into terms which policy makers understand.

Answer provided by John Hunter, Counsellor