Intimate partner violence disclosure in the workplace: examining frequency, workplace occurrences, and pay level

Abstract

Intimate partner violence (IPV) disclosure at work is important, given that disclosure may reduce safety-related risks and allow for better management of workplace disruptions. In line with prior literature, we suggest that when there is more workplace occurrence of IPV and higher frequency of IPV, employees are more likely to disclose to their coworkers. We also theorize that the disclosure decision will depend on employees’ pay. While we expect employees with lower pay levels to be more likely to disclose in either case of increasing IPV workplace occurrences or IPV frequency, we hypothesize that highly paid employees will be especially reluctant to disclose due to the pressures associated with the ideal worker prototype and anticipatory stigma. We test our predictions using survey data from 350 workers across four organizations reporting IPV experiences. We predict and find support that highly paid workers are more likely to disclose when IPV is both high in frequency and occurring at work. Our research points to the importance of organizational hierarchies and individual pay in understanding workplace IPV disclosure decisions.

Keywords:

• Disclosure
• hierarchy
• ideal worker
• intimate partner violence
• pay level
• stigma

Notes

1 The archival data and a description of the data collection process is accessible at https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/NACJD/studies/26041.

2 We note that given this is a formative measure, internal reliability is less applicable since internal consistency is not fundamental to the measure (O’Leary-Kelly et al., 2008).