The Law, Gendered Abuse, and the Limits and Possibilities of Feminist Theory

Reviewing Leigh Goodmark, A Troubled Marriage: Domestic Violence and the Legal System (2011)

Woman Battering and Welfare Reform: The View from a Welfare-To-Work Program

This research compares employment training program staff estimates (N = 118) and enrollee reports (N = 122) of woman battering, that is, the physical violence and other abuse men deploy against their wives and girlfriends. The vast majority of staff estimate that woman battering obstructs the transition from welfare to work for at least some of their clients. Overall, staff respondents\u27 relative sense of the frequency of battering quite accurately reflects enrollee reports. However, staff are especially reluctant to give estimates of physical violence and injury. Moreover, many give very low estimates for those items that are obvious markers of battering, which enrollees report at nontrivial levels. Such discrepancies are particularly disturbing because successful welfare reform implementation depends in part on staff understandings of woman battering as an obstacle to welfareto- work transitio

The Law, Gendered Abuse, and the Limits and Possibilities of Feminist Theory

Reviewing Leigh Goodmark, A Troubled Marriage: Domestic Violence and the Legal System (2011)

WELFARE AS WE [DON'T] KNOW IT: A REVIEW AND FEMINIST CRITIQUE OF WELFARE REFORM RESEARCH IN THE UNITED STATES

Reform of the United States welfare system in 1996 drastically changed welfare receipt for low-income lone mothers. This paper explores the effects of these changes on lone mothers by summarizing empirical work on caseload reduction, labor force participation, income, poverty, material hardship, and family formation. While it appears that the economic status of many lone mothers improved during the economic expansion in the late 1990s, many lone mothers continued to experience poverty and material hardship. Building on the work of feminist scholars from both the US and other countries, this paper goes on to critique mainstream research on welfare reform. It identifies a particularly feminist approach to welfare reform research, stresses its advantages over mainstream research, and speculates about why there is comparatively less feminist research to date. The paper concludes by calling for more structural analyses of poverty and of lone motherhood itself.Welfare reform, lone mothers, feminist research, women's employment, poverty, race, class, gender,

Gender equitable attitudes among adolescents: A validation study and associations with sexual health behaviors

Gender inequitable attitudes are associated with violence perpetration and poor sexual health. There is limited diversity in U.S. samples used to validate gender attitudes measurements. This study assessed a 13-item gender equitable attitudes scale’s validity among a sample of predominantly Black adolescent boys (n = 866; mean age = 15.5, range = 13–19 years) and examined associations with sexual health behaviors. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses tested construct validity. Logistic mixed-effects models were used to explore associations between gender equitable attitudes, adolescent relationship abuse, pornography use, and condom use behaviors; linear mixed-effects models explored associations between gender equitable attitudes and condom negotiation self-efficacy. By pooling data from two other gender transformative programs, Sisterhood 2.0 (n = 246, 13–19-year-old females (mean age = 15.2), 73.6% Black/African American) and Coaching Boys into Men Middle School (n = 958, 11–14-year-old males–6th grade: 10.4%, 7th grade: 36.5%, 8th grade: 53.1–56.6% white), measurement invariance was assessed across Black (n = 400) and white (n = 298) race and male (n = 429) and female (n = 246) gender. A three-factor 11-item scale showed construct validity among a sample of Black adolescent boys, weak factorial invariance across Black and white race, and configural invariance across male and female gender. Gender equitable attitudes were associated with less adolescent relationship abuse, higher condom negotiation self-efficacy, and less pornography use. These findings demonstrate some variability in measurements of gender equitable attitudes by race and gender. Targeting harmful gender norms may help prevent adolescent relationship abuse and improve sexual health behaviors