Evaluating Interventions for Intimate Partner Violence Use in Washington State

Overview

Intimate partner violence (IPV), specifically physical and psychological aggression toward an intimate partner, represents a public health crisis that affects millions of Americans each year. There currently exists very little evidence from randomized controlled trials for the effectiveness of abuser intervention programs designed to prevent and end perpetration of IPV in the general population. This is troubling considering that approximately half a million men and women are court-mandated to these programs each year. The investigators will conduct a randomized controlled non-inferiority trial evaluating the effectiveness of the Strength at Home (SAH) intervention in reducing intimate partner violence (IPV). The overarching aim of this study is to determine whether outcomes achieved through SAH are non-inferior to those achieved through standard IPV interventions offered in the state of Washington (treatment as usual; TAU) among court-involved men who have used IPV. The specific aims are: 1.1: Compare the frequency of physical and psychological IPV, the primary outcomes of interest, across conditions as reported by the male participants and their intimate partners across Time 1 (baseline) and four 3-month follow ups (Times 2-5). It is expected that reductions in physical and psychological IPV perpetration observed in SAH will be non-inferior to those observed in TAU over the course of the year. 1.2: Compare symptoms of PTSD, alexithymia, and alcohol use problems across conditions and assessment time points as reported by the male participants. It is expected that reductions in PTSD symptoms, alexithymia, and alcohol use problems observed in SAH will be non-inferior to those observed in TAU over the course of the year. 1.3: Compare treatment satisfaction across conditions as reported by the male participants across the four 3-month follow ups (Times 2-5). It is expected that treatment satisfaction in SAH will be comparable to or greater than treatment satisfaction in TAU.

Interventions

• Behavioral Strength at Home (SAH)
  SAH is a group intervention that incorporates elements from interventions for violence and trauma. It is administered during 20 two-hour weekly sessions. The program uses a social information processing model based on the premise that trauma negatively impacts one's ability to interpret and respond to social situations effectively. It underscores the importance of cognitive behavioral strategies to monitor one's thoughts and responses to interpersonal situations.
• Behavioral Treatment as usual for IPV
  Treatment as usual for IPV includes court-mandated interventions that require a minimum of 26 two-hour weekly sessions in Washington State and often extend substantially longer.

Primary outcome measures

• IPV assessment [Time frame: Baseline, 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]
• Psychological IPV assessment [Time frame: Baseline, 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]
• Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms [Time frame: Baseline, 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]
• Alcohol use [Time frame: Baseline, 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]
• Alexithymia assessment [Time frame: Baseline, 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]

Secondary outcome measures (1)

• Treatment Satisfaction [Time frame: 3 months, 6 months. 9 months, 12 months]

Eligibility criteria

Inclusion criteria

Men:

• Identify as a man
• Provide consent for the research team to contact his intimate partner(s) for data collection purposes;
• Court-referred for IPV intervention in Washington state

Women:

• Identify as a woman
• Were or currently are an intimate partner involved in an incident of IPV with a court-referred participant

Exclusion criteria

• demonstrates active psychosis that may interfere with their ability to participate in group
• expresses prominent suicidal or homicidal ideation that requires hospitalization
• does not possess proficiency in spoken English
• periods of incarceration after study enrollment

Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.

Healthy volunteers: No

Study design

Allocation

Randomized

Model

Parallel assignment

Masking

Open label

Primary purpose

Treatment

Study locations

United States · 1 center

• BU Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, Psychiatry — Boston

Identifiers

NCT: NCT06526247 · H-44938

Primary sources (government registries)

• ClinicalTrials.gov (US NIH)

View this study on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗