Intimate Partner Violence Entanglements: An Integrative Literature Review

Abstract

Objective: to integrate the theoretical and empirical evidence related to intimate partner violence in the context of public health care. Materials and Method: An integrative review of the literature was carried out following the proposal of Dixon-Woods, Agarwal, Jones, Young and Sutton. The databases consulted were PubMed, Scielo, Medline, Lilacs, Proquest, ESBCO, Science Direct and Scopus and the academic Google metasearch engine in English, Spanish and Portuguese. The following descriptors were used: Partner Violence, Intimate Violence, Intimate Partner, Intimate Partner Abuse, Partner Abuse, Intimate Spouse Abuse, Public Health. Results: 119 articles related to intimate partner violence worldwide were identified. Latin America and North America were the world regions with the highest proportion of identified articles (37.2% and 32.2%, respectively). The Latin American countries with the most contributions on the subject are Brazil, with 17; Colombia, with 6.9%, and Mexico, with 4.3%; While in North America, 29.4% of the articles found were published in the United States. In the period studied, a greater number of articles published in the years 2017 and 2020 were found, most of them (57.1%) used a quantitative methodology. Conclusions: the thematic patterns that emerge from this integrative review reveal the networks of intimate partner violence and show that asymmetric relationships, gender inequality and the multiple forms of violence to which women are exposed are directly influenced by the macho culture and patriarchal.