Older men’s experiences of intimate partner violence and abuse

Research over the last 50 years has demonstrated the significance of intimate partner violence (IPV) as a social issue, but it is only within the last 15 years that there has been a more dedicated and in-depth exploration of men’s experiences. As a consequence we now have a much greater understanding of men’s experience of physical violence, sexual violence coercive control, emotional abuse, as well as the serious and adverse impacts this abuse can have on their physical and mental health. However this research has typically worked with “younger” samples and so there is still a lack of understanding of the ways in which this type of abuse is experienced by older men. The aim of this chapter is to explore the current knowledge on older men’s experience of IPV which includes an overview of what we know from “younger” men’s experiences and the research literature on older women’s experiences and the barriers of older groups in help-seeking, before discussing the relatively small amount of literature that has examined older men’s experiences.