Aggressive behaviour among drug-using women from Cape Town, South Africa: ethnicity, heavy alcohol use, methamphetamine and intimate partner violence

BMC Women's Health

Research Article

Kim Johnson¹  Tara Carney²  Bronwyn Myers²  Tracy L. Kline³  Wendee M. Wechsberg⁴ 

[1] Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drug Research Unit, South African Medical Research Council, PO Box 19070, 7505, Tygerberg, South Africa;Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drug Research Unit, South African Medical Research Council, PO Box 19070, 7505, Tygerberg, South Africa;Department of Psychiatry and Mental Health, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa;Substance Use Gender, and Applied Research Program, Research Triangle Park, RTI, 3040 Cornwallis Road, 27709, Chapel Hill, NC, USA;Substance Use Gender, and Applied Research Program, Research Triangle Park, RTI, 3040 Cornwallis Road, 27709, Chapel Hill, NC, USA;RTI Gender Global Gender Center, Research Triangle Park, 3040 Cornwallis Road, 27709, Chapel Hill, NC, USA;Health, Policy and Administration, Gillings School of Global Public Health, The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA;Psychology in the Public Interest, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA;Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA;

关键词: Substance use;    Aggression;    Violence;    Women;    South Africa;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12905-017-0447-2

 received in 2016-09-01, accepted in 2017-09-20,  发布年份 2017

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundWomen have generally been found to be the victims of violence, but scant attention has been paid to the characteristics of women who perpetrate aggression and violence. In South Africa, violence is a prevalent societal issue, especially in the Western Cape.MethodThis study aimed at identifying factors that were associated with aggression among a sample of 720 substance-using women. We conducted multivariate logistic regression to identify factors that are significantly associated with these behaviours.ResultsEthnicity (Wald Χ2 = 17.07(2), p < 0.01) and heavy drinking (Wald Χ2 = 6.60 (2), p = 0.01) were significantly related to verbal aggression, methamphetamine use was significantly related to physical (Wald Χ2 = 2.73 (2), p = 0.01) and weapon aggression (Wald Χ2 = 7.94 (2), p < 0.01) and intimate partner violence was significantly related to verbal (Wald Χ2 = 12.43 (2), p < 0.01) and physical aggression (Wald Χ2 = 25.92 (2), p < 0.01).ConclusionsThe findings show high levels of aggression among this sample, and highlight the need for interventions that address methamphetamine, heavy drinking and intimate partner violence among vulnerable substance-using women.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© The Author(s). 2017