Intimate Partner Violence among Married Women in Kenya

This study examines the prevalence and determinants of physical, sexual, and life threatening partner violence experienced by married women, using the 2003 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey data. We found that 40 percent of respondents have ever been abused by their husbands. Physical abuse was the most common form of abuse (36%) followed by sexual (13%) and life threatening (6%) abuses. Logistic regression results show significant effects of gender-power factors on each of the three dimensions of abuse. However, ethnicity is the most significant variable, suggesting that cultural norms play a major role in gender relations and wife abuse in Kenya.