Topic: Anger, Intimate Partner Violence, Safety
Target Population: Couples
Sector: Community-Based
Military Sector: Navy
This program is for couples who have experienced mild-to-moderate domestic violence in their relationship but want to remain a couple.
Couples Therapy for Domestic Violence: Finding Safe Solutions, a community-based program, is a curriculum that is designed to provide assessment of and treatment for couples who choose to stay in a relationship after one or both individuals have been violent.
Results from one randomized controlled trial showed that at 6 months after program completion, couples in a multi-couple group showed significantly lower rates of male violence recidivism, marital aggression, and acceptance of wife battering and higher rates of marital satisfaction than those in an individual couple group or a comparison group. Two years after program completion, females reported that males who participated in either the multi-couple or individual couple therapy had lower rates of recidivism than men in the comparison group.
This program intends to help participants stop their violent behaviors and begin to create healthy, fulfilling relationships using an approach called Domestic Violence Focused Couples Treatment (DVFCT). Therapists facilitate this program and assess levels of intimate partner violence with couples and evaluate, at the beginning and the end of each session, the safety among men and women in gender-separate groups. The program highlights the following topics:
This program can be delivered to individual couples or to groups of couples. This program does not focus on serious substance abuse problems, mental health issues, or individuals who would be considered repeat offenders or batterers.
DVFCT was developed at Virginia Tech in 1997, and the curriculum is currently being implemented on several Navy installations for the prevention and treatment of domestic violence. No other previous use information was located.
Training is required for therapists. Facilitators attend a training on using the treatment manual before delivering the program, and they must undergo clinical supervision while working with couples. Please contact Dr. Stith using details in the Contact section for more information.
Considerations for implementing this program include acquiring participant buy-in, recognizing this program may discuss material that is sensitive and personal, understanding that the manual will need to be purchased, hiring therapists to conduct sessions, ensuring facilitators receive training, and finding space and mutually convenient times to implement sessions.
The Clearinghouse can help address these considerations. Please call 1-877-382-9185 or email Clearinghouse@psu.edu
If you are interested in implementing Couples Therapy for Domestic Violence, the Clearinghouse is interested in helping you!
Please call 1-877-382-9185 or email Clearinghouse@psu.edu
This curriculum contains 18 sessions, and each session is approximately 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
The manual is available from several online retailers (e.g., Amazon, Barnes & Noble) for approximately $50.
To move Couples Therapy for Domestic Violence: Finding Safe Solutions to the Effective category on the Clearinghouse Continuum of Evidence at least one external evaluation should be performed that demonstrates sustained, positive outcomes. This study must be conducted independently of the program developer.
The Clearinghouse can help you develop an evaluation plan to ensure the program components are meeting your goals. Please call 1-877-382-9185 or email Clearinghouse@psu.edu
Contact the Clearinghouse with any questions regarding this program.
Phone: 1-877-382-9185 Email: Clearinghouse@psu.edu
You may also contact Dr. Sandra Stith by mail School of Family Studies and Human Services, 101 Campus Creek Complex, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, email sstith@ksu.edu, or visit https://www.apa.org/pubs/books/4317268
https://www.apa.org/pubs/books/4317268 and Mendez, Horst, Stith, and McCollum (2014).
Stith, S. M., Rosen, K. H., McCollum, E. E., & Thomsen, C. J. (2004). Treating intimate partner violence within intact couple relationships: Outcomes of multi-couple versus individual couple therapy. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 30(3), 305-318. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-0606.2004.tb01242.x
Mendez, M., Horst, K., Stith, S. M., & McCollum, E. E. (2014). Couples treatment for intimate partner violence: Clients’ reports of changes during therapy. Partner Abuse, 5(1), 21-40. https://doi.org/10.1891/1946-6560.5.1.21
Stith, S. M., Rosen, K. H., & McCollum, E. E. (2002). Developing a manualized couples treatment for domestic violence: Overcoming challenges. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 28(1), 21-25. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-0606.2002.tb01168.x
Stith, S. M., Rosen, K. H., & McCollum, E. E. (2003). Effectiveness of couples treatment for spouse abuse. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 29(3), 407-426. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-0606.2003.tb01215.x
Stith, S. M., Spencer, C. M., Ripoll‐Núñez, K. J., Jaramillo‐Sierra, A. L., Khodadadi‐Andariyeh, F., Nikparvar, F., . . . Metelinen, J. (2019). International adaptation of a treatment program for situational couple violence. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, https://doi.org/10.1111/jmft.12397
