Forms of Intimate Partner Violence among Women in the Informal Sector in Nakuru Municipality, Kenya

Abstract

Different forms of Intimate Partner violence are experienced in various cultures and affect people across societies irrespective of their economic status. Similar experiences have also been reported in Kenya as shown by the results of this study whose focus was to determine the forms of Intimate Partner violence among women in the informal sector in Nakuru Municipality, Kenya. The study employed ex-post facto research design to undertake inquiry into the occurrence of Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) while simple random sampling was used to select 176 participants who were victims of intimate partner violence and had registered the violence in the five rescue institutions. The researcher administered questionnaire and focus group discussions were used to collect data. The study found out that women experience different forms of IPV which included physical, economic, sexual and verbal. Each of these forms of IPV was further investigated using descriptive statistics and the findings revealed that about 62% of physical cases of violence were due to slapping while in economic violence monitoring expenditure was most common at 52.3%. Regarding sexual violence and verbal violence the study revealed that 61.4% of women experienced forced sexual violence and 58.5% experienced name calling respectively. The findings revealed the most common cases of IPV in each form of violence which should therefore constitute areas of intervention in undertaking measures to reduce its occurrence.