Married women's experience of domestic violence in Malawi: new evidence from a cluster and multinomial logistic regression analysis

Violence against women is a global issue, with estimates indicating that 35% of all women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner violence in their lifetime. In Malawi 42% of evermarried women have experienced some form of violence perpetrated by their current or most recent spouse. A number of studies have investigated intimate partner violence in Malawi, but no study has used cluster analysis to systematically analyse different levels of abuse among married women in Malawi. Using 2015 Malawi Demographic and Health Survey data, we employed cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regression to analyse the distribution of different levels of abuse among married women in Malawi and the key attributes associated with each level of abuse. Correlates of domestic violence differ significantly by levels of abuse, which are distributed as follows: controlling behaviour (11.8%), general controlling behaviour (27.1%), moderate physical and emotional abuse (27.2%) and high and complete abuse (8.5%). Alcohol consumption, ethnicity and woman’s working status were significantly associated with all four levels of abuse. The strength of association between husband’s alcohol consumption, woman’s working status, marriage type and domestic violence increased by level of abuse. For each of these factors, the odds of experiencing violence were lowest in the controlling behaviour group and highest in the high physical and emotional abuse group. The Malawian government should incorporate strategies that discourage excessive drinking, promote messages that women can be breadwinners, and discourage polygamous marriage.