The effect of a savings intervention on women's intimate partner violence victimization: heterogeneous findings from a randomized controlled trial in Colombia.

BACKGROUND: Women's economic empowerment has long been assumed to lead to their social empowerment, but systematic tests of this relationship have only recently begun to appear in the literature. Theory predicts that control over resources, as through a savings account, may increase women's negotiating power and self-efficacy. In this way, "economic empowerment" may lead to "social empowerment," and have related benefits such as helping to reduce risk of intimate partner violence (IPV). The current study tests effects of an economic empowerment intervention on women's social empowerment, IPV victimization, and health. METHODS: We conducted an 18-month randomized controlled trial among 1800 urban poor women in Colombia between 2013 and 2015. The trial tested the impact of a savings account offer bundled with health services (vs. health services alone) on social empowerment outcomes, IPV victimization, and health. RESULTS: The bundled savings treatment did not have average effects on most outcomes, although it produced a small significant increase in financial participation and decrease in symptoms of depression. Treatment effects on perceived norms, decision-making patterns, self-reported IPV victimization, and health depended on whether women's partnerships were free of violence when they entered the trial; specifically, women in nonviolent partnerships at baseline showed more positive effects of the intervention. CONCLUSIONS: Although bundling economic empowerment interventions with support features has been shown to empower poor women, this trial found that a bundled treatment did not on average improve most social and health outcomes of poor women experiencing IPV. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Registered retrospectively, prior to realization of outcomes, 5/29/14: Evidence in Governance and Politics #20140529AA .

Economic Policies and Intimate Partner Violence Prevention: Emerging Complexities in the Literature.

Although the question of whether economic policies serve to reduce rates of intimate partner violence (IPV) has long been raised, rigorous tests of this question have only begun to take place recently. Given the mixed evidence to date, much remains unknown about the circumstances in which a positive or negative relationship holds between changes in financial well-being and IPV. We describe an empirically based theoretical model that may link economic empowerment to IPV and that highlights research questions for further testing. This model reflects two theoretical pathways through which economic policies may reduce IPV: A program may activate social and psychological empowerment as protective factors and a program may deactivate cognitive and behavioral risk factors such as stress and substance abuse. We then consider the relevance of each of a range of economic policies and review existing experimental evidence regarding the effect of such programs on IPV. We discuss unconditional and conditional cash transfers, savings programs, microfinance and income generation programs, and economic programs combined with relationship-related training. Gaps in research on this topic and emerging complexities in the literature suggest the following three key areas that would benefit from greater research and evaluation: comparison across programs based on size and design, assessment of the returns to economic empowerment of young adults, and more evaluations in high-income countries.

The Effect of a Supreme Court Decision Regarding Gay Marriage on Social Norms and Personal Attitudes.

We propose that institutions such as the U.S. Supreme Court can lead individuals to update their perceptions of social norms, in contrast to the mixed evidence on whether institutions shape individuals' personal opinions. We studied reactions to the June 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of same-sex marriage. In a controlled experimental setting, we found that a favorable ruling, when presented as likely, shifted perceived norms and personal attitudes toward increased support for gay marriage and gay people. Next, a five-wave longitudinal time-series study using a sample of 1,063 people found an increase in perceived social norms supporting gay marriage after the ruling but no change in personal attitudes. This pattern was replicated in a separate between-subjects data set. These findings provide the first experimental evidence that an institutional decision can change perceptions of social norms, which have been shown to guide behavior, even when individual opinions are unchanged.