A Safe Place To Go? A Descriptive Study of Safety Strategies Among College Female Students

• Author: Lisa R. Muftić,Sara Zedaker
• Published date: 01 June 2017
• Date: 01 June 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0734016817704701
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

A Safe Place To Go?

A Descriptive Study of Safety

Strategies Among College

Female Students

Sara Zedaker

1

and Lisa R. Muftic

´

1

Abstract

Safety planning, simply put, is a detailed, personalized, and practical plan that is created to protect

oneself against an abusive (or potentially abusive) partner. Relying on self-reported data from an

online survey of female college students from a state university in Texas, this study focuses on safety

strategies centered around escape planning (e.g., whether or not students have a safe place to go,

where they would go, and what they would take with them) as well as what factors influence this

(e.g., prior experiences with intimate partner violence). Using bivariate analyses to determine any

association between factors that influence various aspects of the safety planning process, a number

of important findings are reported. The majority of students indicated that they had a safe place to go

and this was most likely to be a family or friend’s residence. Additionally, most students noted that

they would take what is typically discussed in safety planning strategies (e.g., money, cellular phone,

keys, identification, and clothing). Students who reported lower levels of social support and prior

exposure to parental domestic violence were more likely to report they did not have a safe place to

go. These findings underscore the importance of expanding violence prevention activities on college

campuses beyond sexual assault, with information provided to all students on safety planning.

Keywords

safety planning, escape planning, safety strategies, intimate partner violence, college students

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a pervasive social problem with one in three women experiencing

IPV at least once within their lifetime (Black et al., 2011; Schafer, Caetano, & Clark, 1998).

Although IPV can impact women at any stage in the life course, research indicates that women

between the ages of 18 and 24 are at an increased risk. It is not surprising, then, to find that 10–50%

of college students have experienced victimization at the hands of an intimate partner at least once

during their collegiate career (Kaukinen, Gover, & Hartman, 2012). In addition, female college

1

Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX, USA

Corresponding Author:

Sara Zedaker, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX 77341, USA.

Email: sbs020@shsu.edu

Criminal Justice Review

2017, Vol. 42(2) 188-205

ª2017 Georgia State University

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DOI: 10.1177/0734016817704701

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students are at an elevated risk for IPV due to some aspects of the college experience, including

independent living often at an extended distance from parents (Lehrer, Lehrer, & Zhao, 2010).

Compounding risk, college women who have experienced IPV are unlikely to access formal

systems of help, such as calling the police or seeking services from an emergency shelter or

advocacy center (Coker, Derrick, Lumpkin, Aldrich, & Oldendisk, 2000; Fugate, Landis, Riordan,

Naureckas, & Engel, 2005; Shorey et al., 2015). Rather, research indicates that young women lean

on informal networks for assistance, most often by confiding in a friend, family member, or cow-

orker about the abuse they are suffering (Hyden, 2015). While disclosing an abusive situation may

be cathartic for the victim, the utility of this behavior in regard to providing a protective factor from

(re)abuse has been questioned (Goodman, Dutton, Van kos, & Weinfurt, 2005), especially with

regard to particularly violent situations (Goodman, Dutton, Weinfurt, & Cook, 2003).

One strategy that college students might use to prevent and protect themselves from IPV is safety

planning. Safety planning generally centers on the premise that individuals in abusive situations

need to plan for the likelihood that they will have to leave their partner, either as a protection strategy

(e.g., fleeing an immediate abuse situation) or as a leaving strategy (e.g., planning to leave after a

certain period of time; Parker, Debnam, Pas, & Bradshaw, 2015). As part of the safety planning

process, a woman is asked to identify a safe place they can go, whether that be for the short- (i.e.,

protection strategy) or long-term (i.e., leaving strategy; Parker et al., 2015). While safety planning is

a core component of most family violence shelters and victim-advocacy programs in North America,

very little is known about the use of this tool among nonsheltered populations, including college

students (Davies, Lyon, & Monti-Catania, 1998). The current report provided results from what is

believed to be the first empirical study of female college students’ safety planning strategies.

Safety Strategies

Women within abusive relationships often engage in various safety strategies in an effort to protect

themselves (and their children) from the violence they are experiencing (Parker & Gielen, 2014).

Safety strategies involve a myriad of behaviors. Attempts to pacify the abuser (e.g., keeping the

house clean, dinner warm, and the children clean) are used strategically to avoid an abusive episode

or to mitigate the seriousness of a current violent episode (e.g., by trying to calm the abuser down,

not crying, apologizing; Goodkind, Sullivan, & Bybee, 2004). Resistance, which may include

defensive violence (e.g., fighting back), is another strategy used by women to protect themselves

from abuse (Thomas, Goodman, & Putnins, 2015). Other safety strategies include accessing formal

(e.g., calling the police or going to an emergency shelter) and/or informal (e.g., getting a family

member to talk to the abuser) networks (Parker & Gielen, 2014). Finally, victims may partake in

safety planning which generally involves formulating a plan of escape (Parker & Gielen, 2014).

While safety planning is a fairly common intervention used when working with domestic vio-

lence victims, safety plans are quite heterogeneous ranging from information dissemination to

comprehensive planning following assessment of an individual’s short- and long-term needs

(Murray et al., 2015). Additionally, safety planning can be done face-to-face in conjunction with

an advocate or online via a technology-based a pproach (e.g., the Safer and Stronger Progra m;

Oschwald et al., 2009). Regardless of form, the purpose of safety planning is to empower victims

to strategize ways in which they can keep themselves (and their children) safe (Parker et al., 2015).

Examples of strategies employed within a safety plan include hiding money or keys for future

use, coming up with a code word to signal help from a neighbor, and having a list of important

numbers to use in case of an emergency (Campbell, O’Sullivan, Roehl, & Webster, 2005; Davis,

2002; Goodkind et al., 2004). One fairly universal component to safety planning is to have the

individual who is completing the safety plan identify a place she could go in an emergency situation

(e.g., her aunt’s), also referred to as escape planning. She is also asked to think about and plan for

Zedaker and Muftic

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