Judy L Postmus
Biographic Data
| ID | 198033 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Judy L Postmus |
| GIVEN NAMES | Judy L |
| FAMILY NAME | Postmus |
| SIGNATURE | POSTMUS J L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7265-5864 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 36 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 142 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 36 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Economic Abuse and Depression
IPV Experiences and Financial Strain Over Time
Financial strain is one hardship faced by female survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) that is often overlooked. This paper examined the relationships between multiple forms of abuse-with a focus on economic abuse-and financial strain. Guided by stress process model, this study tested two hypotheses: (1) economic abuse is associated with financial strain more than other types of IPV; and (2) decreased economic abuse relates to financial st…
Exploring Factors Associated with Intimate Partner Violence Survivors’ Use of Financial Safety Planning Strategies
The purpose of this study was to explore financial strategies that intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors undertake when engaging in safety planning and to examine the relationship between these strategies and various survivor characteristics. As part of the cross-sectional study, a total of 425 female survivors of IPV were surveyed. To examine the relationship between financial safety planning strategies and participants' demographic characte…
Escala de Abuso Economico
Economic Abuse as an Invisible Form of Domestic Violence
The predominant perception of intimate partner violence (IPV) as constituting physical violence can still dominate, particularly in research and media reports, despite research documenting multiple forms of IPV including sexual violence occurring between intimate partners and various forms of psychological and emotional abuse. One frequently hidden or “invisible” form of abuse perpetrated within intimate partner relationships is economic abuse, a…
Administering the U.S. Family Violence Option
The Family Violence Option (FVO) was designed to help survivors of domestic violence (DV) more easily secure income support in the United States (U.S.), without placing them at risk of further abuse. The objective of this study is to determine whether the decision-making of advocates responsible for determining waiver recommendations under the FVO is influenced by the relationship status of DV survivors. Recursive partitioning was used to analyse…
Guest Editor Introduction
Working together to protect women and children from domestic violence
Creating a Tool for Assessing Domestic Violence Risk and Impact Among Tanf Clients
The Family Violence Option (FVO), a provision of the 1996 welfare legislation, allows states to waive certain program requirements for domestic violence (DV) survivors in order to protect them from danger or penalties. The absence of a standardized method for assessing risk and impact has been an impediment to states' use of the FVO, particularly in the granting of waivers. The purpose of this study was to address this limitation by developing an…
The Center on Violence Against Women and Children at Rutgers University
The mission of the Center on Violence Against Women and Children (VAWC) at the Rutgers University School of Social Work is to strive to eliminate physical, sexual, and other forms of violence against women and children and the power imbalances that permit them. This mission is accomplished through the use of a collaborative approach that focuses on interdisciplinary research, education, and community engagement that impact communities and policie…
Revictimized Adult Women
What Is Economic Self-Sufficiency? Validating a Measurement Scale for Policy, Practice, and Research
Economic self-sufficiency has emerged as a policy goal of antipoverty programs in many nations. Although the policy direction of these programs is clear, the definition and measurement of economic self-sufficiency is not. This study revisits a scale that was designed in 1993 and has experienced a growth in use after two decades of little attention. Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and bivariate correlations, the scale’s validity…
Women From Different Ethnic Groups and Their Experiences With Victimization and Seeking Help
For women who experience abuse in childhood or adulthood, the assumptions are that surviving includes seeking help. This article presents an exploratory study on the prevalence of victimization in the lives of Caucasian, African American, and Latina women, if and to whom they disclosed their victimization, and where they turned for services and support. The results indicate Caucasian women turn more to traditional, therapeutic sources compared wi…
Measuring Economic Abuse in the Lives of Survivors
Recent attention has been given by researchers to understanding how abusers use economic abuse strategies. Unfortunately, limited measures are available to accurately understand the prevalence of economic abuse in the lives of survivors. Recently, researchers created the 28-item Scale of Economic Abuse (SEA) but further validation is needed. This article describes the psychometric evaluation of the SEA through confirmatory and exploratory factor …
Implementing a Financial Management Curriculum With Survivors of IPV
There is a clear need for financial literacy programs specific to survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV), as the skills and knowledge acquired during these programs stand to increase survivors’ ability to achieve economic independence. In order to understand advocates’ experiences in providing a financial literacy program, this study reports the findings of a qualitative study among 19 domestic violence advocates across 10 states. Findings …
Predicting Bystander Behavior to Prevent Sexual Assault on College Campuses
Bystander intervention has been increasingly applied to prevent sexual violence on college campuses. Its underlying theory assumes unidirectional relationships between variables, predicting that bystander behaviors (i.e., actions taken to intervene in sexual violence situations) will be influenced by bystander intentions (BI; i.e., likelihood to intervene in the future), which in turn will be affected by bystander efficacy (BE; i.e., confidence t…
Economic Empowerment of Impoverished IPV Survivors
Best practices in advocating for economic empowerment of impoverished intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors require the comprehensive and holistic organization of program and service delivery systems. This article outlines the best practices literature that addresses IPV in the lives of impoverished women, as well as the literature that specifically examines the interventions to economically empower IPV survivors—whether impoverished or not. …
Financial Literacy and Economic Empowerment of Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence
Financial literacy helps build economic empowerment and self-sufficiency among economically vulnerable groups. This article explores the effect of financial literacy on the economic empowerment of survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) and investigates whether the relationship might differ for women receiving public assistance. Using survey data from 120 survivors of IPV, regression models examine the direct and interactive effects of finan…
Exploring the Challenges Faced by Latinas Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence
This article explores the help-seeking challenges faced by a community sample of 25 Latina intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors. We include the experiences of Latinas who sought help from IPV services and those who did not. Additionally, we utilize an ecological framework to highlight the barriers that are present at multiple levels for Latinas who seek assistance, and we include their recommendations for increasing access. The information p…
Economic Self-Sufficiency Among Divorced Women
Understanding how to promote economic self-sufficiency, or the ability to sustain oneself financially, has important implications for programs that help support divorced and separated women and for government agencies hoping to reduce reliance on government aid. The following analysis focuses specifically on divorced and separated women utilizing services from agencies geared toward helping people with financial, career, and other forms of assist…
Professional Efficacy and Working With Victims of Domestic Violence or Sexual Assault
Violence against women is a pervasive and widespread problem, but the understanding of how to prepare social workers best for working with survivors is inadequate. One area of focus is professional efficacy, which stems from the literature on self-efficacy. This article focuses on the confidence and comfort that social work students have in working with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault and identifies the factors that affect profe…
A Statewide Exploration of Bystander and Gender-Role Attitudes in New Jersey
The state of New Jersey has recommended the widespread adoption of bystander intervention education as a way to engage communities in the prevention of sexual violence. The study reported here gathered baseline data from a random sample of New Jersey residents about their attitudes as bystanders, gender roles, and sexual violence. The analysis of the data revealed that the women reported less support for rigid gender roles and a greater willingne…
Economic abuse, physical violence, and union formation
Understanding Economic Abuse in the Lives of Survivors
Intimate partner violence (IPV) often includes economic abuse as one tactic commonly used by an abuser; unfortunately, there is a lack of empirical understanding of economic abuse. Additionally, research is limited on the predictors of economic self-sufficiency in the lives of women experiencing IPV. This paper furthers our knowledge about economic abuse and its relationship with economic self-sufficiency by presenting the results from an explora…
The impact of physical and economic abuse on maternal mental health and parenting
Women's Experiences of Violence and Seeking Help
Every day, women survive physical or sexual violence. Some survive as a result of services they receive in the aftermath of the abuse. The study presented here explored women's experiences of victimization and their use of and perceptions about the services they received. It is learned that what providers usually prioritize and what the women in this study used-namely emotional, psychological, and legal support-are not what these women identified…
Measuring Economic Abuse in the Lives of Survivors
Recent attention has been given by researchers to understanding how abusers use economic abuse strategies. Unfortunately, limited measures are available to accurately understand the prevalence of economic abuse in the lives of survivors. Recently, researchers created the 28-item Scale of Economic Abuse (SEA) but further validation is needed. This article describes the psychometric evaluation of the SEA through confirmatory and exploratory factor …
The impact of physical and economic abuse on maternal mental health and parenting
Analysis of the Family Violence Option
The Family Violence Option (FVO) provides exemptions from Temporary Assistance to Needy Families requirements to victims of domestic violence. This article examines the link between domestic violence and welfare and analyzes the FVO using the strengths perspective. This perspective identifies women's strengths and needs and the barriers they must overcome to become self-sufficient
The Function of Shelters for Women
Emergency shelter is an important resource for women experiencing a housing crisis. However, the outcomes are uncertain for women served within programs intended to provide relief and safety in times of crises. Are shelters more a function of social control or a function of assisting women to secure housing and employment? This article presents the findings from a study of sheltering programs in Ohio. These shelters appear to reproduce and reinfo…
What Is Economic Self-Sufficiency? Validating a Measurement Scale for Policy, Practice, and Research
Economic self-sufficiency has emerged as a policy goal of antipoverty programs in many nations. Although the policy direction of these programs is clear, the definition and measurement of economic self-sufficiency is not. This study revisits a scale that was designed in 1993 and has experienced a growth in use after two decades of little attention. Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and bivariate correlations, the scale’s validity…
Predicting Bystander Behavior to Prevent Sexual Assault on College Campuses
Bystander intervention has been increasingly applied to prevent sexual violence on college campuses. Its underlying theory assumes unidirectional relationships between variables, predicting that bystander behaviors (i.e., actions taken to intervene in sexual violence situations) will be influenced by bystander intentions (BI; i.e., likelihood to intervene in the future), which in turn will be affected by bystander efficacy (BE; i.e., confidence t…
Exploring the Challenges Faced by Latinas Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence
This article explores the help-seeking challenges faced by a community sample of 25 Latina intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors. We include the experiences of Latinas who sought help from IPV services and those who did not. Additionally, we utilize an ecological framework to highlight the barriers that are present at multiple levels for Latinas who seek assistance, and we include their recommendations for increasing access. The information p…
Professional Efficacy and Working With Victims of Domestic Violence or Sexual Assault
Violence against women is a pervasive and widespread problem, but the understanding of how to prepare social workers best for working with survivors is inadequate. One area of focus is professional efficacy, which stems from the literature on self-efficacy. This article focuses on the confidence and comfort that social work students have in working with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault and identifies the factors that affect profe…
When child abuse overlaps with domestic violence
Women From Different Ethnic Groups and Their Experiences With Victimization and Seeking Help
For women who experience abuse in childhood or adulthood, the assumptions are that surviving includes seeking help. This article presents an exploratory study on the prevalence of victimization in the lives of Caucasian, African American, and Latina women, if and to whom they disclosed their victimization, and where they turned for services and support. The results indicate Caucasian women turn more to traditional, therapeutic sources compared wi…
Addressing the Problem of Domestic Violence
The social work profession has a complex and arguably problematic history in relation to the problem of domestic violence. Through a review of abstracts of social work articles published from 1985 to 2000, the authors sought to determine whether anything has changed since Davis’s (1987) seminal study regarding the way in which the profession addresses the problem of domestic violence. The findings indicate that although researchers have done a go…
Valuable Assistance or Missed Opportunities
Do shelters help battered women navigate the welfare system and access waivers under the Family Violence Option (FVO)? Data on sheltered battered women's experiences with the New York State welfare system suggest that the answer is both yes and no. Sheltered women are granted waivers at a far higher rate than the general welfare population in New York State, and sheltered women report that shelter staff assistance makes it easier to apply for wel…
Implementing a Financial Management Curriculum With Survivors of IPV
There is a clear need for financial literacy programs specific to survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV), as the skills and knowledge acquired during these programs stand to increase survivors’ ability to achieve economic independence. In order to understand advocates’ experiences in providing a financial literacy program, this study reports the findings of a qualitative study among 19 domestic violence advocates across 10 states. Findings …
The impact of emotional and physical violence during pregnancy on maternal and child health at one year post-partum
Challenging the Negative Assumptions Surrounding Civil Protection Orders
Restraining orders, often used as the first line of protection for battered women, are surrounded by negative assumptions and beliefs held by key stakeholders who question their use and effectiveness. This article evaluates current research on restraining orders by describing four negative assumptions that were found in a review of qualitative and quantitative research. Each negative assumption includes a brief discussion of the origin of the ass…
Financial Literacy and Economic Empowerment of Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence
Financial literacy helps build economic empowerment and self-sufficiency among economically vulnerable groups. This article explores the effect of financial literacy on the economic empowerment of survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) and investigates whether the relationship might differ for women receiving public assistance. Using survey data from 120 survivors of IPV, regression models examine the direct and interactive effects of finan…
Economic abuse, physical violence, and union formation
Comparing the policy response to violence against women in the USA and South Korea
English Violence against women is a major public health and human rights crisis affecting women from all countries. This article presents a comparative policy analysis of the Violence Against Women Act (USA) and the Protection Act (South Korea), providing social work and research implications. French La violence faite aux femmes est un fléau affectant les femmes de tous les pays, qui constitue un important problème de santé publique tout en allan…
Battered and on Welfare
Noting the incidence of battered women on welfare, lawmakers passed the Family Violence Option (FVO), which allows states to offer waivers from welfare program requirements. Assumptions were made that many women would seek relief under the FVO. However, reports indicate that less than 5 percent of welfare recipients are receiving waivers. This paper presents the findings from a qualitative study that sought to explore the experiences of 29 batter…
Escala de Abuso Economico
Revictimized Adult Women
Analysis of the Family Violence Option
The Family Violence Option (FVO) provides exemptions from Temporary Assistance to Needy Families requirements to victims of domestic violence. This article examines the link between domestic violence and welfare and analyzes the FVO using the strengths perspective. This perspective identifies women's strengths and needs and the barriers they must overcome to become self-sufficient
Valuable Assistance or Missed Opportunities
Do shelters help battered women navigate the welfare system and access waivers under the Family Violence Option (FVO)? Data on sheltered battered women's experiences with the New York State welfare system suggest that the answer is both yes and no. Sheltered women are granted waivers at a far higher rate than the general welfare population in New York State, and sheltered women report that shelter staff assistance makes it easier to apply for wel…
Addressing the Problem of Domestic Violence
The social work profession has a complex and arguably problematic history in relation to the problem of domestic violence. Through a review of abstracts of social work articles published from 1985 to 2000, the authors sought to determine whether anything has changed since Davis’s (1987) seminal study regarding the way in which the profession addresses the problem of domestic violence. The findings indicate that although researchers have done a go…
Battered and on Welfare
Noting the incidence of battered women on welfare, lawmakers passed the Family Violence Option (FVO), which allows states to offer waivers from welfare program requirements. Assumptions were made that many women would seek relief under the FVO. However, reports indicate that less than 5 percent of welfare recipients are receiving waivers. This paper presents the findings from a qualitative study that sought to explore the experiences of 29 batter…
Challenging the Negative Assumptions Surrounding Civil Protection Orders
Restraining orders, often used as the first line of protection for battered women, are surrounded by negative assumptions and beliefs held by key stakeholders who question their use and effectiveness. This article evaluates current research on restraining orders by describing four negative assumptions that were found in a review of qualitative and quantitative research. Each negative assumption includes a brief discussion of the origin of the ass…
Comparing the policy response to violence against women in the USA and South Korea
English Violence against women is a major public health and human rights crisis affecting women from all countries. This article presents a comparative policy analysis of the Violence Against Women Act (USA) and the Protection Act (South Korea), providing social work and research implications. French La violence faite aux femmes est un fléau affectant les femmes de tous les pays, qui constitue un important problème de santé publique tout en allan…
Women's Experiences of Violence and Seeking Help
Every day, women survive physical or sexual violence. Some survive as a result of services they receive in the aftermath of the abuse. The study presented here explored women's experiences of victimization and their use of and perceptions about the services they received. It is learned that what providers usually prioritize and what the women in this study used-namely emotional, psychological, and legal support-are not what these women identified…
Women's Experiences of Victimization and Survival
In an effort to more fully understand the experiences and aftermath of girlhood and adult woman physical, sexual and psychological victimization, research was undertaken that explored the prevalence and the consequences of such victimization, and the survival strategies women activate at various points in their lifespan in the aftermath of that violence. Women participants were recruited from five different communities; three urban, one rural and…
When child abuse overlaps with domestic violence
The Function of Shelters for Women
Emergency shelter is an important resource for women experiencing a housing crisis. However, the outcomes are uncertain for women served within programs intended to provide relief and safety in times of crises. Are shelters more a function of social control or a function of assisting women to secure housing and employment? This article presents the findings from a study of sheltering programs in Ohio. These shelters appear to reproduce and reinfo…
The impact of emotional and physical violence during pregnancy on maternal and child health at one year post-partum
Understanding Economic Abuse in the Lives of Survivors
Intimate partner violence (IPV) often includes economic abuse as one tactic commonly used by an abuser; unfortunately, there is a lack of empirical understanding of economic abuse. Additionally, research is limited on the predictors of economic self-sufficiency in the lives of women experiencing IPV. This paper furthers our knowledge about economic abuse and its relationship with economic self-sufficiency by presenting the results from an explora…
The impact of physical and economic abuse on maternal mental health and parenting
Economic Self-Sufficiency Among Divorced Women
Understanding how to promote economic self-sufficiency, or the ability to sustain oneself financially, has important implications for programs that help support divorced and separated women and for government agencies hoping to reduce reliance on government aid. The following analysis focuses specifically on divorced and separated women utilizing services from agencies geared toward helping people with financial, career, and other forms of assist…
Professional Efficacy and Working With Victims of Domestic Violence or Sexual Assault
Violence against women is a pervasive and widespread problem, but the understanding of how to prepare social workers best for working with survivors is inadequate. One area of focus is professional efficacy, which stems from the literature on self-efficacy. This article focuses on the confidence and comfort that social work students have in working with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault and identifies the factors that affect profe…
A Statewide Exploration of Bystander and Gender-Role Attitudes in New Jersey
The state of New Jersey has recommended the widespread adoption of bystander intervention education as a way to engage communities in the prevention of sexual violence. The study reported here gathered baseline data from a random sample of New Jersey residents about their attitudes as bystanders, gender roles, and sexual violence. The analysis of the data revealed that the women reported less support for rigid gender roles and a greater willingne…
Economic abuse, physical violence, and union formation
Economic Empowerment of Impoverished IPV Survivors
Best practices in advocating for economic empowerment of impoverished intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors require the comprehensive and holistic organization of program and service delivery systems. This article outlines the best practices literature that addresses IPV in the lives of impoverished women, as well as the literature that specifically examines the interventions to economically empower IPV survivors—whether impoverished or not. …
Financial Literacy and Economic Empowerment of Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence
Financial literacy helps build economic empowerment and self-sufficiency among economically vulnerable groups. This article explores the effect of financial literacy on the economic empowerment of survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV) and investigates whether the relationship might differ for women receiving public assistance. Using survey data from 120 survivors of IPV, regression models examine the direct and interactive effects of finan…
Exploring the Challenges Faced by Latinas Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence
This article explores the help-seeking challenges faced by a community sample of 25 Latina intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors. We include the experiences of Latinas who sought help from IPV services and those who did not. Additionally, we utilize an ecological framework to highlight the barriers that are present at multiple levels for Latinas who seek assistance, and we include their recommendations for increasing access. The information p…
What Is Economic Self-Sufficiency? Validating a Measurement Scale for Policy, Practice, and Research
Economic self-sufficiency has emerged as a policy goal of antipoverty programs in many nations. Although the policy direction of these programs is clear, the definition and measurement of economic self-sufficiency is not. This study revisits a scale that was designed in 1993 and has experienced a growth in use after two decades of little attention. Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and bivariate correlations, the scale’s validity…
Women From Different Ethnic Groups and Their Experiences With Victimization and Seeking Help
For women who experience abuse in childhood or adulthood, the assumptions are that surviving includes seeking help. This article presents an exploratory study on the prevalence of victimization in the lives of Caucasian, African American, and Latina women, if and to whom they disclosed their victimization, and where they turned for services and support. The results indicate Caucasian women turn more to traditional, therapeutic sources compared wi…
Measuring Economic Abuse in the Lives of Survivors
Recent attention has been given by researchers to understanding how abusers use economic abuse strategies. Unfortunately, limited measures are available to accurately understand the prevalence of economic abuse in the lives of survivors. Recently, researchers created the 28-item Scale of Economic Abuse (SEA) but further validation is needed. This article describes the psychometric evaluation of the SEA through confirmatory and exploratory factor …
Implementing a Financial Management Curriculum With Survivors of IPV
There is a clear need for financial literacy programs specific to survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV), as the skills and knowledge acquired during these programs stand to increase survivors’ ability to achieve economic independence. In order to understand advocates’ experiences in providing a financial literacy program, this study reports the findings of a qualitative study among 19 domestic violence advocates across 10 states. Findings …
Predicting Bystander Behavior to Prevent Sexual Assault on College Campuses
Bystander intervention has been increasingly applied to prevent sexual violence on college campuses. Its underlying theory assumes unidirectional relationships between variables, predicting that bystander behaviors (i.e., actions taken to intervene in sexual violence situations) will be influenced by bystander intentions (BI; i.e., likelihood to intervene in the future), which in turn will be affected by bystander efficacy (BE; i.e., confidence t…
Psychology (31 works) · Intimate Partner and Family Violence (30 works) · Medicine (30 works) · Poison control (27 works) · Domestic violence (24 works) · Political science (23 works) · Suicide prevention (20 works) · Medical emergency (15 works) · Human Factors and Ergonomics (14 works) · Environmental health (13 works)