ABSTRACT
VIOLENCE is often perpetrated by people a victim knows well. Thus, in the United States, women are more likely to be assaulted, battered, raped, or mur dered by a current or former male part ner than by all other assailants com bined.1 A 1985 study of intact couples found that approximately one of every eight husbands had performed one or more acts of physical aggression against his female intimate(s) during the survey year, with more than one third of these acts involving severe aggression, such as punching, kicking, choking, beating up, or using a knife or gun.8 Although spouse abuse takes the form not only of men abusing women but of women abus-
ing men, this article’s primary focus will be with spousal abuse of women by men. Women’s diminished authority and power within the family have made them more vulnerable to partner violence.3 Further more, when men commit acts of violence against their female partners, their acts are more likely to result in medical inju ries than are women’s acts of violence to ward male partners.2 That violence occurs with relative frequency and severity within personal relationships poses a special obstacle to preventing it and to in terceding on the victim’s behalf. The val ues of family autonomy and privacy are deeply cherished, embedded in our polit ical, social, and cultural heritage and root ed in such fundamental ideals as selfgovernment and freedom from outside in terference in diverse spheres of life. The locus of violence also clouds our under standing of the ethical basis for physician intervention.
