DOMESTIC ABUSE LINKED TO ALCOHOL, JOB STABILITY

Male Ethnicity Is Not A Factor, Study Says

Men's alcohol abuse and shaky employment status rank among the most
important precipitating factors in domestic violence against women, while
ethnicity plays virtually no role at all, according to one of the most
comprehensive studies to date of assailants and their victims.

The nationwide research, led by University of California at Los Angeles and
the University of Southern California physicians and published today in the
New England Journal of Medicine, also confirmed that women are at greatest
risk of being assaulted by former partners, underscoring women's
vulnerability after a breakup.

The study is one of two in the journal to show that violence stems
primarily from the characteristics of the male assailants rather than those
of the female victims. In the past, researchers have often focused on the
victim's background, such as whether she had been raped as a child or was a
substance abuser.

``I think we have to continue to support women who are battered, but we
also have to shift our focus to the batterers,'' said Dr. Jeane Ann Grisso
of the University of Pennsylvania, lead author of one of the studies which
looked at women in a low-income community in Philadelphia.

In terms of social programs ``the men have been ignored,'' Grisso said.

Like the UCLA-USC group, the Philadelphia team also found that substance
abuse -- in this instance, cocaine abuse -- and pervasive economic
insecurity were important contributors to assaults on women. Both sets of
researchers said that economic class, rather than ethnicity, was a key
element.

``I don't think that violence is race-or ethnicity-motivated. It has to do
with socioeconomic status,'' said Dr. Demetrios N. Kyriacou, lead author of
the UCLA-USC study. ``Black women sustain much more violence because they
are much poorer in general.''

In particular, the risk factors for male abusers include intermittent
employment or unemployment as well as having less than a high school
education, the UCLA-USC team found. Lower education levels, which are
linked with lower economic status, may render men less able to communicate
their frustrations verbally, other researchers have suggested.

Violence against women can be so prevalent that it becomes an ugly part of
the landscape. The Philadelphia study showed that low-income women who seek
care for their injuries in emergency rooms are more likely to have been
assaulted in their neighborhoods by friends and acquaintances than by their
intimate partners -- often out of doors and overwhelmingly as witnesses
look on.

The two studies in the journal compared abused women being treated in
emergency rooms for their injuries with female patients being treated for
other medical complaints. The UCLA-USC team looked at 256 abused adults and
659 nonabused peers; the Philadelphia team compared 405 adolescent girls
and women with 520 peers.