ABSTRACT
Gender-based violence (GBV) is psychological, physical, sexual, or economic abuse directed against women and girls because of their subordinate status in society (Heise et al., 1999). 1 Among the various forms of GBV, intimate partner violence (IPV) 2 is the most pervasive (Watts and Zimmerman, 2002; United Nations Population Fund, 2005; Heise et al., 2002; Tjaden and Thonnes, 2000; Garcia-Moreno et al., 2005). According to a review of 48 population-based studies representing a variety of countries around the world, between 10 percent and 69 percent of women reported experiencing physical IPV at some point in their lives (World Health Organization, 2002). In Jordan, these estimates range from approximately one in three women (Clark et al., 2009) to nearly one in two (Khawaja and Barazi, 2005).
