UCalgary researchers aim to stop domestic violence before it happens

A new report from the University of Calgary is taking a different perspective on the increasing problem of intimate partner violence and femicide in the city.

Researchers from the School of Public Policy have released their findings after going over 10 years of data from the Calgary Police Service (CPS).

Report co-author, Ken Fyie, says in 2019, nearly all men charged with domestic violence were already known by police.

“Seventy-three per cent of men in this set had at least one police interaction, whether it was a criminal charge and/or a domestic conflict encounter, in the 10 years prior to a charge being laid for domestic violence,” he explained.

A more recent example is a Jan. 16 homicide, when a man facing domestic violence charges killed a woman who had a no-contact order against him outside a south Calgary school.

Lana Wells, who also co-authored the report, says unlike much of the currently available research, researchers didn’t solely focus on the after affects of male-on-female domestic violence, and how the victim could have prevented it.

Instead, they worked on understanding points of intervention that might prevent domestic violence from occurring in the first place.

Wells says this research is critical, as preventing domestic violence is not just a policing issue, it also falls on the shoulders of community members.

“Men really influence other men, and so how you talk about women, how you disrupt the violence in your own relationships, how you model your own relationships, all of that matters to the people around you,” she explained.

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“This isn’t just a policing issue, and there’s flags earlier on — friends and family usually know when there’s a perpetrator or someone causing harm in their families — communities know,” Wells continued. “So this really has to be all of our issues, especially earlier on before it escalates.”

The researchers say this is a different take on the problem because there isn’t much data available that looks at why men continue to be the leading perpetrators in domestic violence.

CPS Chief Mark Neufeld says understanding prevention is critical at this time.

“In 2023 we responded to over 4,000 domestic violence incidents across the city, so that really represents probably between 11 and 12 incidents every day,” he said.

However, Calgarians are becoming increasingly willing to do their part, according to David Sannes with the FearIsNotLove organization.

“Our men’s counselling program is in such high demand that our organization has had to acquire funding to expand our hiring of therapists because we’re getting on average, 15 to 30 calls from non-mandated men every month to access clinical supports to address their anger,” he said.

For some people, there is one thing that keeps them from reaching out.

“There is a lot of finger-wagging and a lot of shame in the community and that can turn people away from help-seeking behaviour,” Sannes said.

UCalgary researchers hope this report will influence public policy, future legislation, and programming in Alberta.