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Full text release has been delayed at the author's request until July 30, 2024

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Identity and Romantic Relational Meaning-Making After Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence

Burns, Aimee Jeanne
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5037-1502
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1627034532114917

Abstract Details

2021, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, Communication Studies.
Within the United States, 1 in 4 women and 1 in 10 men have experienced sexual violence, physical violence, and/or stalking from an intimate partner (CDC, 2018). Intimate partner violence (IPV) is associated with poor health, substance abuse, depression, and symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Additionally, the post-IPV period is linked with depressive disorders resulting in diminished self-esteem, lower levels of perceived social support, and reduced quality of life. There is a growing interest in understanding how post-IPV individuals recover from violent relationships and maintain non-violent romantic relationships. Although these studies highlight the complex and multidimensional ways in which post-IPV recovery occurs, the role of communication in the post-IPV recovery process and romantic relational meaning-making has yet to be explored. Therefore, Hecht’s (1993) communication theory of identity (CTI) was used as a sensitizing framework for this dissertation. To accomplish these research goals, I employed a qualitative approach, utilizing Charmaz’s (2014) grounded theory to conduct intensive co-constructed in-depth interviews with 22 post-IPV adults and were not currently in violent relationships. This dissertation identified several new understandings of post-IPV identity construction, management, and communication. In analyzing the personal, enacted, relational, and communal layers of post-IPV identities, this dissertation discovered particularly noteworthy findings. These include how IPV trauma can result in identity veils and four identity gaps, which emerged both during IPV perpetration and the post-IPV recovery process. These identity gaps included personal-personal, personal-enacted-relational, personal-relational, and personal-communal. Understanding how these gaps inhibited participants from fully communicating their post-IPV identities, this study explored how these gaps can be negotiated. Findings also include four essential elements to post-IPV romantic relational meaning-making: open and honest communication, safe and supportive nonverbal communication, control and choice, and it takes work. In addition to highlighting key theoretical implications, this dissertation detailed applied implications for three groups impacted by IPV: post-IPV individuals, informal post-IPV support networks, and formal IPV advocacy. Future directions for research are provided, as well. Overall, this dissertation found that although life and love after violence are incredibly complex and varied, it is filled with moments of resistance, resilience, recovery, and revival.
Lisa Hanasono, Ph.D. (Advisor)
Sandra Faulkner, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Lengel Lara, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Laura Landry-Meyer, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
231 p.
Communication
Intimate Partner Violence; Post-IPV Recovery; Posttraumatic Growth; Identity; Communication Theory of Identity; Identity Gap Negotiation; Romantic Relational Meaning-Making; Qualitative; Constructivist Grounded Theory; Interviews; Relational Communication

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Burns, A. J. (2021). Identity and Romantic Relational Meaning-Making After Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence [Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1627034532114917

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Burns, Aimee. Identity and Romantic Relational Meaning-Making After Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence. 2021. Bowling Green State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1627034532114917.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Burns, Aimee. "Identity and Romantic Relational Meaning-Making After Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence." Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 2021. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1627034532114917

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1627034532114917
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This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.