community, they may also serve as an obstacle to accessing supports. In some religious communities, members still believe that violence is acceptable to use in an intimate relationship. They may cite religious texts or scriptures that they believe justify use of violence in relationships. Such interpretations, whether intentional or not, create additional pressure on survivors to forego getting help (Davis & Jonson-Reid, 2020; Istratii & Ali, 2023) . Some faith-based communities place a particular emphasis on the value of forgiveness, and survivors may be
encouraged to forgive their abuser because forgiveness is expected in persons of faith (Simonič, 2021) . In other religious groups, having faith entails making sacrifices and bearing up under some kinds of burdens without complaint in order to protect their soul or a potential afterlife. These notions can encourage a person of faith to stay in an abusive relationship despite knowing it is wrong and wanting to escape the abuse (Bloom, 2021) . It is also critical that practitioners consider a client’s subculture. Box 2 provides a brief example.
Box 2: IPV and Military Families Practitioners must also consider subcultural considerations with populations such as military families. With military deployments continuing at high rates and 1.6 million children with a military parent (US Department of Defense, 2023) , human service and mental healthcare professionals must be aware of the significant rates of IPV within military families. Research suggests that IPV perpetration among veterans is greater than civilian rates, and that families with active duty parents may experience more violence than do those with veteran parents (Sparrow et al., 2018) . Some posit that these differences may be due to “cultural spillover theory,” the idea that the use of violence in one area of life (e.g., military experience) may spill over to other areas of life where violence is considered unacceptable (e.g., intimate relationships) (Lysova & Straus, 2019). Additionally, postcombat conditions, experiences of violence, and related disorders such as traumatic brain injuries and posttraumatic stress disorder may be accompanied by violent behaviors (Portnoy, Relyea, et al., 2020). Other risk factors for IPV in military families include frequent relocations, extended separations during deployment, and conflict between family and service commitments (Park et al., 2021). Assessment of a military family’s IPV history and types of IPV is an essential aspect of intervention. Practitioners should be aware of the IPV risk factors for military families and should strive to be military-informed when working with these families. They should be aware also of the potential cultural barriers to treatment, including stigmatization of mental health services, military versus civilian culture, and warrior culture (McGuffin et al., 2021). Cultural Considerations: Social Level
2020) . Structural violence can affect individuals or entire systems, such as those associated with criminal justice, immigration, and community or family groups. The following sections describe how individuals experiencing IPV may be prevented from seeking help due to the effects of discriminatory treatment, the criminal justice system, historical context, and lack of cultural competence. Discriminatory treatment is also at play in how people of color are received when attempting to access both general and mental healthcare (Eylem et al., 2020; Robinson et al., 2020) . Both types of systems have been found to be less accessible and to provide reduced quality of care and even harmful services to people of color. In addition, the long history of abusive and discriminatory treatment in healthcare (see for examples the Guatemala experiments, the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, the case of Henrietta Lacks, the Baltimore lead paint studies, and the water contamination crisis in Flint, Michigan) has created a legacy of distrust in communities of color that may accompany victims of IPV when making decisions about seeking care. These disparities and deceptions in treatment create a sense that healthcare systems can be unsafe and are neither accessible nor welcoming to those in need. A consequence is that help seeking may be delayed for as long as possible to avoid utilizing these systems. These examples provide a greater context for understanding how discriminatory treatment can become a barrier to receiving services. to jail, and the survivor can remain in the home (Cordier et al., 2019) . However, the decision to petition for a protection order is often affected by the victim’s belief in the police and court systems to protect them (Holmes et al., 2021) . In many marginalized communities, reporting or reaching out for support to address IPV could involve a criminal justice intervention, particularly if there are limited options for support resources (Boggess & Chamberlain, 2020) . At the same time, some survivors in these communities some
Social constructs and experiences can also affect how a person works through challenges of IPV, and these must be negotiated along with individual-level barriers. Socially constructed influences such as racism, gender or sexuality bias, and socioeconomic status are collectively referred to as “structural” influences and can have strongly detrimental effects on individuals—an experience conceptualized as structural violence (Burton, Gilpin, & Draughon Moret, Discriminatory Treatment For many people of color, discriminatory treatment in systems that are meant to provide care and support results in disengagement from these systems (Monterrosa, 2019) . Moreover, survivors who choose not to come back and utilize the service may also share their negative experiences with others in the community. For example, child welfare systems have been found to respond to IPV differently among Black mothers as compared with White mothers (Thomas et al., 2022) . Black children are more likely than White children to be removed from their homes when investigations reveal domestic violence, and because states vary in the mandatory reporting requirements for child witnesses to IPV, there are often confused and inconsistent responses from child welfare agencies with respect to IPV. Although victims of IPV are often placed in the difficult and sometimes untenable position of protecting their children from the batterer, victims of color must also weigh the great chance of becoming separated from their children if they seek assistance for or disclose IPV (Lippy et al., 2020) . The Role of the Criminal Justice System Over the past several decades, domestic violence has been characterized as a criminal offense and the judicial system seen as its main remedy (Goodmark, 2018) . Many resources have gone toward enhancing criminal justice policies and procedures to respond to IPV. Civil protection orders are a very commonly used legal remedy for survivors, intended to prevent contact and revictimization by the abuse, and supposedly offer victims alternatives to the criminal justice and shelter systems: perpetrators are not automatically sent
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