Questionnaires

Questionnaire #1 (Social Workers and Victim's Advocates)

1. On average, how many domestic violence cases do you work per month?

2. What concerns do your clients typically have?

3. What resources do your clients need to make a successful transition away from their abuser?

4. Do you feel your clients would benefit from having a neutral space to meet with you?

5. Do you feel the library could provide a neutral space for meetings?

6. Do you feel your clients would be willing to meet at the library and would benefit from programming highlighting library resources that could aid them?

7. What resources do you feel are most needed by your clients?

8. How do you feel the library can best promote help for your clients, while maintaining safety?

9. Would you or someone from your office be willing to meet with clients and potential clients at the library if a meeting space were provided?

10. What concerns would you have about using the library as a neutral meeting space?


Questionnaire #2 (Shelter Workers)

1. Do you feel your clients would benefit from having a neutral meeting space, where they could meet with a member of your organization?
   

2. Do you feel the library could provide such a space?
   

3. What concerns would you have about using the library as a neutral meeting space?
   

4. What concerns do your clients typically have (either in meeting or in transitioning to a new life)?

5. What resources do your clients need to make a successful transition away from their abuser?
   
   
6. Do you feel your clients would be willing to meet at the library and would benefit from programming highlighting library resources that could aid them?
   
   
7. What resources do you feel are most needed by your clients?
   
   
8. How do you feel the library can best promote help for your clients, while maintaining safety?
   
   
9. Would you or someone from your office be willing to meet with clients and potential clients at the library if a meeting space were provided?
   
   
10. What concerns would you have about using the library as a neutral meeting space?
    

Questionnaire #3 (Survivors of Domestic Violence)

1. What resources have you needed in transitioning to an independent life? Have you utilized the library in any way?
   

2. Do you feel you would have been more willing to meet with an advocate or shelter worker in a neutral space, such as the library?
   

3. Do you feel a library program highlighting resources for survivors of domestic violence could be effective?
   

4. What advice do you have for executing such a program safely? What concerns would you have for such a program?
   

5. What are the biggest issues you've encountered in transitioning to an independent life, and do you feel there is any way the library could help address those issues?
   

Literature

When Men Murder Women--Violence Policy Center Report
      --South Carolina ranks #2 in 2012 in the nation--however, this is based on women per capita. SC actually had the most women killed with 50 female homicide victims.
     --Nationally, 93% of female victims were murdered by someone they knew, and 62% of these were wives, common-in-law wives, ex-wives, or girlfriends of the offenders. This does not count those who were ex-girlfriends.
     --In South Carolina:
             -Average age of victim: 46 years old
             -86% of female victims were killed by someone they knew, 68% were killed by intimate partners


Help-Seeking for Intimate Partner Violence and Forced Sex in South Carolina
--Among women experience IPV, 53% sought community-based or professional services
--36.4% saw or talked to a doctor or nurse about the violence, 45.5% received mental health services, 10.9% sought the services of DV shelters, 16.4% attended support groups
     --Most found the contact was helpful, no matter the form of help
--Fewer than 10% of female victims seek services from battered women's shelters

Laws Mandating Reporting of Domestic Violence
--As few as 1 in 20 of women seeking medical attention are identified as having suffered domestic violence
--Mandated reporting can have an adverse effect, increasing violence from the abuser
--Health care providers can make other services and education available, and offer to aid in the reporting if the victim desires

Combating Domestic Violence: Findings from an Evaluation of a Local Domestic Violence Court
--Having a designated court decreased the amount of repeat arrests for DV offenders
--Consolidating resources in a rural area made those resources more available to both victims and offenders

Ideas for research questionnaires

I think a few different questionnaires would serve this study best. We need to reach a number of different groups of people, to get a large scope of ideas and feedback.

--Questionnaire for shelter workers
        -This would be a questionnaire for those who are currently working with victims of DV. What do these volunteers think would be helpful for the women they help? Are there library resources that they feel would be useful? Can they see using the library as a neutral space for meetings, or in other ways?

--Questionnaire/interviews of victims/survivors
       -I would like to reach out to survivors of DV, as well as women who are in the midst of escaping such situations. Ideally this would be done with anonymous questionnaires to be distributed at shelters, but would be supplemented by interviews. Questions would focus around what these women feel would be helpful to someone getting out of a DV situation--what resources they wished they had had/been aware of, would they have used the library if they had felt this was an area of help/resource

--Questionnaire of library staff
      -How open are library staff to incorporating this kind of help into their library? Are there additional personnel issues (increased security, etc) or concerns? What kind of education or training would need to take place? How aware are they of their existing resources, and how to repurpose those resources for DV victims?

What can libraries do in the field of domestic violence?

The trend in libraries now is to move more towards being a community center. Many are looking at adding social workers to help with needs from the community. But these needs typically focus on issues such as homelessness. While a worthy need, I wonder if we couldn't use the library as a neutral place where women could feel safe gathering resources and meeting people who can help them.

A woman might feel intimidated going to a shelter or police station, or may not understand the legal options that she has for protection. But if she could meet with an off-duty police officer at the library, or with a social worker, or a shelter worker, she might feel safer. Plus, saying that she's going to the library wouldn't be a lie, and wouldn't be likely to raise the suspicions of her abuser. And in today's tech-heavy age, many abusers are using things like tracking their victim's GPS to keep tabs on them.

I'm shifting the focus of my research proposal (or rather, narrowing it down) to ask what role libraries can play to help improve the situations for at-risk individuals. Libraries are already set up to help with job hunts--perhaps we could assist at-risk individuals in not just job hunts, but looking for apartments or transitioning from shelters to regular life. People may need to move to a new area to be safe, and may need to do research on prospects in that area to make the move.

Topic Choice

I've decided that my focus for my research proposal will be domestic violence in South Carolina. I will propose research that will attempt to find solutions to the current issues facing SC's women, and look at a national level (or at least in other states) to see how SC compares. It's not a secret that South Carolina is one of the highest ranking states in terms of domestic violence cases (I believe the statistics specifically deal with those killed by their partners each year). 

I think a lot of research focuses on the numbers, and then those numbers are reported in a "this is a tragedy/we should do something" sort of way. Only nothing ever gets done. I would propose a project that would also seek to propose solutions, such as looking at methods that have been successful in other states, or asking women who are coming out of such situations what they think would help work for others. 

I might also look at domestic violence in the news, and how our response to situations such as Rhianna and Chris Brown and the recent NFL scandal reflect the societal views of domestic violence.