Food Insecurity & Intimate Partner Violence Against Women: Results from the California Women's Health Survey

OBJECTIVE:

To investigate the association between food insecurity and intimate partner violence in a population-based sample of heterosexual women.

DESIGN:

Logistic regression was used to evaluate the association between three levels of food insecurity and intimate partner violence.

SETTING:

Data from 6 years of the California Women's Health Survey.

SUBJECTS:

Randomly selected women (n 16 562) aged 18 years and older from the State of California, USA.

RESULTS:

We found: 

1. that African-American women had a higher prevalence of food insecurity and were more likely to report severe intimate partner violence; 
2. a strong positive association between food insecurity and intimate partner violence; 
3. evidence of effect modification of the association between food insecurity and intimate partner violence by marital status; and 
4. higher odds of intimate partner violence among those reporting more severe food insecurity.

CONCLUSIONS:

Food insecurity is an important risk indicator for intimate partner violence among women. Understanding the factors that put women, especially minority women, at greatest risk facilitates intervention development.

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By:  Ricks JL1, Cochran SD1, Arah OA1, Williams JK2, Seeman TE1.

• 1Department of Epidemiology, Fielding School of Public Health, University of California,Los Angeles, CA, USA.
• 2Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences,Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA. 
• Public Health Nutr. 2016 Apr;19(5):914-23. doi: 10.1017/S1368980015001986. Epub 2015 Jun 22.

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