ABSTRACT
Children's voices are central to understanding their experiences of living in homes with domestic abuse. However, gaining access to children and therefore gaining insight into their individual experiences is fraught with methodological problems. Consequently, much of what is known is obtained through semi-structured interviews with adults recalling their experiences, which typically reflect adults’ memories of their experiences of domestic abuse rather than children's contemporaneous experiences. To better represent children's experiences, this research explores children's voices as captured at the point of informal peer-to-peer disclosures on internet message boards. The chapter first outlines the novel methodological approach developed to collect 3,242 message board posts for analysis. Using a corpus-based approach, the feelings children describe in these posts are explored. Whilst unsurprisingly there is a prevalence of negative feelings, they often arise out of concern for others including the perpetrator rather than the child themselves. We conclude by considering implications for practitioners.
