Barriers to seeking help among abused Iranian women
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify barriers to seeking help among abused Iranian women.
Design/methodology/approach
This qualitative research was carried out using content analysis approach. The participants were 24 married women who were selected from health care centers, recreational centers, and two universities in Tehran, Iran. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect the data.
Findings
During data analysis, four themes emerged that explained barriers to seeking help in the participants: “fear of negative consequences of help-seeking,” “lack of resources,” “beliefs and attitudes,” and “indirect experiences of not being supported.”
Originality/value
This study has practice and policy implications for promoting help-seeking among abused women. Based on the results, to promote help-seeking, intervention plans must focus on empowering women to improve their education and employment, eliminating attitudes and beliefs hindering help-seeking, and fortifying formal and informal support systems for abused women.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Conflict of interest: the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest about the present study.
Funding: none declared. The authors express appreciation to the participants who shared their experiences with the authors.
Citation
Taherkhani, S., Negarandeh, R., Simbar, M. and Ahmadi, F. (2017), "Barriers to seeking help among abused Iranian women", The Journal of Adult Protection, Vol. 19 No. 5, pp. 261-273. https://doi.org/10.1108/JAP-03-2017-0007
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2017, Emerald Publishing Limited