by Alisha Katz

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Domestic violence can leave a lasting injury that cannot always be seen: damage to the brain. Strangulation or choking and blows to the skull—some of the most common forms of this abuse—can cause physical trauma, while symptoms like anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress can make the effects of the injury difficult to recognize and treat.

This often-overlooked connection is at the center of new University of Florida research examining intimate partner violence, or IPV, among military spouses. On Oct. 29, during Domestic Violence Awareness Month, the UF doctoral student who spearheaded the research will present her findings to the Florida National Guard.

"Almost 90% or more of IPV is targeted to the head, neck and face. You don't necessarily see anything because it doesn't always leave marks," said Sam Goldstein, the study's lead researcher, who is a student in the UF Department of Health Education & Behavior, as well as a domestic violence survivor and a military spouse.

"When you look at IPV on its own, and then head trauma on its own, they often have similar negative health and mental health outcomes. Post-traumatic stress disorder, in particular, has a lot of symptom overlap with brain injury, and then anxiety and depression. All of these emotions are exacerbated by these two different situations."

In her cross-sectional pilot study, Goldstein studied 125 military spouses who had experienced IPV—involving physical, sexual, psychological or financial abuse—with and without head trauma.

Preliminary results showed that participants with IPV-related head trauma reported higher levels of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress, and a greater percentage reported chronic pain and cannabis use. Many of these women also indicated experiencing intimate partner sexual violence in their lifetimes.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men experience IPV in their lifetimes. Data from the National Violent Death Reporting System suggest that about 1 in 5 homicide victims are killed by an intimate partner. Abusers are known to target a victim's head, neck or face more than anywhere else on the body, through such actions as choking, strangulation, shaking, shoving and direct hits, according to the Center on Partner-Inflicted Brain Injury.

Several negative health outcomes are associated with this violence, including conditions affecting the heart, muscles and bones, as well as the digestive, reproductive and nervous systems. Studying military spouses who have experienced IPV-related health outcomes provided a unique set of insights for Goldstein.

"The experiences of military spouses are quite different than those of civilian community-dwelling women," Goldstein said. "They don't stay in one place very long, and because of that, there's a stronger likelihood of disrupting or deprioritizing their care."

To address this, Goldstein intends to look closely at recommending screenings for potential IPV-related brain injuries in Veterans Health Administration and Department of War–affiliated care settings. As part of UF's Sexual Assault & Alcohol Prevention Research Lab, Goldstein and other researchers are focused on addressing unmet needs and developing interventions for adolescents, college students and military service members.

"Military spouses are looked at as the primary support person of the service member, but they too require physical and emotional support. When you have brain injuries that are unaddressed, and they're compounding other mental health issues, this could be contributing toward difficulties with parenting, emotional regulation, supporting their spouse and engaging care services," said Goldstein, who anticipates submitting her study for publication this month.

"It goes back to the traditional saying, 'You need to put on your own oxygen mask before you help the other person with theirs.'"

Provided by University of Florida

Source: MedicalXpress

Original article: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-10-domestic-violence-highlights-overlooked-links.html