Are Mexican Immigrant and Mexican American Female Victims of Intimate Partner Violence Being Served in Memphis, Tennessee?

Domestic violence against women is an oppressive condition that extends across race, class, and gender. This work examines intimate partner violence against women in Memphis, Tennessee, focusing on Mexican immigrant and Mexican American female survivors of domestic violence.

Author M. Helena Vanderlei Collins interviews ten Mexican immigrant women and seven Mexican American women to investigate factors that influence help-seeking behavior. Collins focuses on the perceptions of Mexican immigrant and Mexican American women regarding the social services available to them and explores how their help-seeking behavior is affected by their degree of acculturation and the incidence of intimate partner violence.

Collins employs a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to answer seven key research questions. The quantitative instruments include ARSMA-II, the Inventory of Abusive Behavior, and a customized demographic questionnaire. The qualitative data is drawn from the semi-structured interviews with the domestic violence survivors. Collins concludes her study by describing the challenges women of Hispanic origin face when seeking help from social service providers and by offering recommendations on how to improve the quality of services these women receive.