'Intimate partner violence as a public health issue is still under-studied among men, particularly sexual minority men'
Sexual minority men on the receiving end of intimate partner violence also have worse mental health outcomes including depression, suicide ideation, and suicide attempts, according to a new meta-analysis by UConn professor Chenglin Hong.
"Looking at the larger context, intimate partner violence as a public health issue is still under-studied among men, particularly sexual minority men," Hong says. "It's usually considered under the heterosexual umbrella: men as perpetrators, women as victims or survivors. But the issue affects sexual minority men just as much, or more, as heterosexual women."
Hong's meta-analysis "The Associations Between Intimate Partner Violence and Mental Health Outcomes Among Sexual Minority Men: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis" looked at 22 studies on the topic conducted between 2003 and 2022, both in the U.S. and around the world, including China and the United Kingdom.
Published in January by the academic journal Trauma, Violence, and Abuse, it marks the first of its kind in more than a decade, with the prior meta-analysis on the topic conducted in 2014.
Among his findings, Hong determined that sexual minority men experiencing intimate partner violence are almost 3x more likely to have suicide ideation or attempts, compared to sexual minority men who didn't experience such violence.
"Men in general experience higher rates of suicide-related outcomes, but they often don't seek mental health services due to stigmas around masculinity," Hong explains. "But those who experience intimate partner violence may be even more limited. For example, they might be scared to see a provider because their partners may find out."
The meta-study, which Hong says was not funded but purely volunteer work, included a team of researchers across the country from institutions including Washington University in St. Louis, UC Davis, Michigan, UCLA, and Penn State.
At the end of the study, Hong makes several recommendations, including incorporating intimate partner violence screening as a standard part of healthcare and mental health assessments for men.
"I'm a social worker," Hong says. "A lot of the time, when we work with clients and refer them to different agencies, there are logistics: transportation, insurance issues. So the idea here is how to optimize integrated care by providing health care, mental health care, and intimate partner violence services in the same setting."
If Hong's proposed changes become more widespread, hopefully such issues of intimate male-male partner violence can dramatically decreased.
