Family violence study shows Motueka community’s awareness

“Family violence doesn’t discriminate.”

A recent study completed by Women’s Support Motueka has pinpointed the community’s level of awareness about domestic violence.

In the 2022-2023 period, the organisation received 495 referrals, with 449 related to family violence.

The report states that family violence has been described as an epidemic in New Zealand, and that “anywhere between 50-87 per cent of people who experience family violence do not report it to the police at all”.

Community engagement coordinator Mikayla Cahill carried out the “community readiness” study, and she presented the findings to the centre’s “community and whanau” combined services meeting last month.

Seeking response from all parts of the community, the four respondents represented sectors from government, non-government, health, and marae.

“There is very little sociological research about family violence in our region, so it was important to hear about how our region is unique and what responses are needed to reduce the impacts of family violence,” she says.

The study checked for the Motueka community’s attitudes, prevention and intervention efforts, as well as its knowledge and recommendations surrounding domestic violence.

“We go into detail about what family violence actually is, because family violence isn’t always physical,” Mikayla told the meeting’s attendants.

The study shows, on the nine-point scale that ranges from no awareness to a high level of community ownership, that the Motueka community is about halfway, sitting at the preplanning and preparation stages. This means that there are “resources available, but little awareness of services and the seriousness of the issue of family violence,” the report states.

The respondents all expressed that there were two definite groups within the community.  The first is those who are directly affected by family violence, be they victims or family, friends and neighbours of victims. The second group, encompassing those who are not directly affected, tend to lack “knowledge and acceptance”, the report states.

Reporting to the meeting, Mikayla said that the second group sat in a place of denial, because they think “this hasn’t happened to me, it hasn’t happened to people I know”.

“I wasn’t overly surprised by the responses,” Mikayla told The Guardian.  “Our participants are kaimahi who see our community members every day and know what could be implemented to help.”

The study’s action points are to create a three-tiered system to help prevent family violence.

A school outreach programme, to be designed this year in consultation with schools and whānau, will contain practical information for both students and parents about family violence and age-appropriate consent education.

“This acts as primary prevention as it aims to prevent violence from ever occurring in the first place,” the report states.

An awareness campaign will form a secondary prevention, because “every single participant stated that there needed to be increased awareness of the services available in our region”.

Mikayla said that this would also include a “relationship red flag” campaign, to help people recognise unhealthy behaviour within relationships before it escalated to family violence.

The third initiative will be “cycle-breaker” workshops, to soften the effects of long-term abuse and intergenerational trauma.

The Community Readiness Study Report can be viewed here.

Centre manager Maluz Moreno says that the organisation is extremely excited about these initiatives as the centre continues to work toward preventing violence in the community. She says that people can support their services with a donation.