What is Batterer Counseling?

While most domestic violence organizations focus first, and mainly, on the survivors of abuse, many do offer something called batterer counseling with the hopes that future violence can be prevented by stressing abuser accountability and education.

Jennifer Polzin is the CEO of Tubman, Minnesota’s largest domestic violence service agency. Based in the Twin Cities, it offers all types of family crisis and support services, including an 18-week therapy program for batterers, both male and female, who either have a prior history of abuse or who are nearing a point where they feel like they may become abusive, says Polzin. The program started in the ‘90s when Polzin says Tubman’s board of directors started receiving more and more feedback from survivors who said they didn’t necessarily want their relationship to end, they just wanted the violence to stop. “Many were asking for services for their abusive partner.”

The question of whether or not batterers can change their abusive ways has long been a hotly debated topic. Emerge, the first counseling and education program designed to stop domestic violence in the U.S., founded in 1977 by psychologist David Adams, even states that the question of whether or not batterers can reform “does not have a simple answer. Someone who truly wants to stop … will work to do so. Someone who doesn’t take such services seriously is at greater risk to re-offend,” they write on their website.

Tubman’s stance is that “violence is a learned behavior, but we know it can be unlearned,” says Polzin. Plus, she knows couples will stay together or separate regardless of what a service provider advises them to do. “For years and years, if the survivors we were serving were trying to reconcile or go back [with their abuser] because they weren’t ready to leave, they were often reluctant to share that with us because they were fearful of more judgment.” They chose to work with, instead of against, the batterers. They also the hope that batterer counseling will prevent abusers from reoffending. “If they [batterers] don’t learn to change their behavior, even if they don’t go back to that same partner, they’re going to find another partner, and that relationship is going to have the same, abusive outcome.”

How It Works

The majority of the batterers that attend Tubman’s program are court-ordered, though some are voluntary. Polzin describes the counseling, which takes place once a week for two hours, led by licensed mental health professionals, as research-based and holistic.

“It’s about emotional regulation, behavioral management, communication and learning a new framework of relationships. Power and control is one topic, but we also talk about how to tolerate discomfort and managing one’s own anxiety in the face of someone else’s anxiety, and how to stand on one’s own two feet while also being close to someone.”

The counseling also focuses on revisiting past trauma. “We know there is a large number of participants who have been victims of abuse, whether as a child or through other violence, like gang violence, or other types of assault. And, a large percentage live with traumatic brain injuries. These are not excuses, but there is a correlation.”

While Polzin says many batterer counseling programs make it a point to hold the abusive person accountable for the abuse, Tubman’s program wants the abusive person to learn how to hold themselves accountable, “so, when the program’s done, they can continue in their relationship or with their parenting and know they can prevent violence.”

Polzin says the program initially served 20-some people a year at its inception, but now sees approximately 100 participants a year cycle through. Measuring its effectiveness is done in several ways. There are recidivism checks to see if the offender has offended since completing the program. This relies on the offender’s probation officer reporting any offenses, or through Tubman’s staff checking a statewide criminal database. So far, their checks show 90 percent of participants don’t reoffend within a year of completing.

But, they also know that abuse can happen behind closed doors, unreported to law enforcement. To track that, they rely on voluntarily check-ins from both the participant and survivors. “We don’t require the victim to participate—we’ve found that can increase the resistance on the part of the participant, and we don’t want to unintentionally put the victim at any more risk. But if there’s anything the victim wants us to know, we’re accessible.”

Relying on survivor input and police reports makes measuring the success of batterer counseling an imperfect science at best. For this reason, and the fact that most abusers aren’t interested in reform, advocates widely agree that batterer counseling is not a cure-all, but more so another tool in the movement to end domestic violence.

Polzin knows that, and says that while she hears anecdotally that their program helps better some relationships, she acknowledges, “It depends on how receptive the person is to it and what they stand to lose.”

You can find nine signs that indicate an abuser is more likely to reform in “Can Abusers Change?”

Emerge! Center Against Domestic Abuse's Program

While most domestic violence services exist with the survivor in mind, getting them to a safe place and keeping them safe, according to DomesticShelters.org, 27 percent of domestic violence programs offer counseling for a less-likely demographic as well: the abusers.

We first looked at the 18-week batterer therapy program offered at Tubman, Minnesota’s largest domestic violence service agency, which they’ve offered for more than two decades. But in Tucson, Ariz., the idea is a bit newer. For the last 2 ½ years, Emerge! Center Against Domestic Abuse, the largest provider of domestic abuse and prevention services in southern Arizona, has been providing a batterer treatment and intervention program that CEO Ed Murcurio-Sakwa says expands the focus beyond just those who have gotten caught, and goes beyond just the parameters of physical violence.

“The work we need to do to end domestic violence is certainly broader than battering—there’s also coercive control.” The men’s education program does focus just on male abusers, though Murcurio-Sakwa knows there are many other configurations of abuse—women against men, same-sex relationships, etc., however, “the vast majority of domestic violence is men against women, so that is what this is focused on.”

How It Works

The program began through the help of a federal grant given to Pima County Adult Probation, which then partnered with Emerge. Approximately two-thirds of the participants are court-ordered while a third sign up voluntarily. “Their partner often tells them, ‘If you don’t go, I’m out,’” explains Mercurio-Sakwa, “because they understand there’s something not right about how they’re showing up in the relationship.” So far, Emerge’s program has seen around 100 participants.

Accountability is at the core of Emerge’s program, says Mercurio-Sakwa, which consists of 24 two-hour sessions for voluntary participants, and up to 52 sessions for those who are court-ordered to attend. The idea is that abusive behavior is rooted in individual choices, the pattern of which he feels men learn from their communities, both their micro-community of family (e.g., their parents or at school) and the macro-community of society, which teaches men what manhood and womanhood is supposed to be.

Mercurio-Sakwa explains the program’s ideological premise. “Abusive behavior is learned. We’re allowed to do it and it works, so we do it. When I say ‘we,’ it’s not just the bad guys versus the good guys. We don’t believe in that dynamic. We’re all raised in the same society and have the same male privilege. Those who use forms of controlling behavior can unlearn what they’ve been taught and can learn a different way of being.”

And, does he believe those who abuse can change their ways? “I’ve seen it happen. They change either because their belief system changes or they don’t want the consequences,” though, ultimately, he admits he would rather see abusers change their ways because their belief system changes. “Above all, we just want safety for women.”

Rating Its Effectiveness

Recidivism—or, whether or not the offender gets arrested again for abuse—is the traditional way to judge the effectiveness of a program like this, but Mercurio-Sakwa calls this a false dynamic. “Those who get caught represent just a fraction of those who abuse. Just because an abuser learns how not to get caught doesn’t mean the abuse has stopped.” Instead, he says Emerge relies mainly on victim contact. “We reach out to the victims of every participant. It’s totally voluntary and confidential. If they’re interested, we keep up ongoing communication to see if there are changes in behaviors at home. That’s really our greatest measure of success.”

He admits this is hard to quantify in a percentage amount. “There are so many variables, but yes, we’re finding that a lot of folks are seeing changes in behaviors.” He says Emerge is hoping to start a more formal evaluation process in the near future.

“If we have no hope that men can change, then we have no hope that we can end domestic violence. It’s important we really start talking about this.”

The Family Place's Program

Finally, we talked to The Family Place, a family violence prevention and advocacy organization in Dallas, Texas established in 1978. They began offering one of the first batterer intervention and prevention programs in the country, starting in the mid-‘80s. Their 24-week program was organized using The Duluth Model, an approach that’s been in place for more than three decades, and which focuses on the widely-accepted idea that the accountability for the abuse must be placed on the abuser, and the blame taken off the victim.

“Participants have to own what they did,” says Paige Flink, CEO of The Family Place, a position she’s held for 17 years and counting. “We ask them, ‘Why are you here?’ To say, ‘Because I was found guilty,’ isn’t enough. It’s because ‘I abused my partner.’”

Nearly 99 percent of the participants who go through the program are court-ordered to do so; it’s often part of their community restitution, she explains. The Family Place sees up to 1,000 participants a year, which is good or bad, depending on how you look at it. The majority is male, some 85 percent, Flink estimates. But females batter, too, and they treat them as well. A separate group meets to educate gay abusers, “just because of the different dynamics,” Flink explains. “But it’s all the same information.”

And in the past year, The Family Place has established a program for high-risk offenders, those who have been convicted of felonies or who have a high lethality probability, aka, they’re deemed most likely to murder their partner. They take the classes after their jail sentence has ended, most with ankle bracelets monitoring their whereabouts. They get 30 weeks of education, and Flink calls it “very intensive.” Her hope, however, is to shorten that window of time between an offense and the offender taking accountability. Too much time between the two, say several years from arrest to education as it sometimes works out to be, and Flink says, “you lose that ability to impact change.”

The Curriculum

Classes involve subjects like techniques and tools for better communication, how violence affects your children, awareness-building and what respect looks like. “We talk about their beliefs, their self-talk, the right that they think they have to be dominant. We discuss emotional abuse, name-calling, cheating and why constantly trying to control another’s behavior is wrong. There are 24 different topics,” says Flink.

She also acknowledges the importance of talking about non-physical violence and dispelling the “it’s not battering without bruises” belief that batterers and survivors alike often maintain. “It’s part of what we have done as a culture to make it OK. The put-downs, the belittling, the eating away at someone’s psyche …. a survivor will say, ‘Well, he didn’t hit me, so I’m not being abused.’ But then he won’t give her money to buy groceries for the kids. And she doesn’t see that as abuse.”

Does It Work?

Ask a dozen advocates if batterer reform is possible and you’ll get a dozen different answers, and Flink knows this, saying their program is only one piece of the reform process. It’s certainly not a one-stop-shop. “About 70 percent of our participants grew up either being battered or seeing battering. If abuse is ingrained in someone, it’s less likely they’ll be able to change. But, not every man who saw his mom being battered grew up to be a batterer, so we know batterers choose to use this past violence to gain power.”

One of the ways The Family Place gauges effectiveness of their program is to look at the recidivism rate. In 2014, 94 percent of batterers were not arrested in the year following their completion of the program. Flink says they consider this success. “The fact that the violence has not risen to the level of needing intervention means our batterer’s program has had a positive impact on the life of the family.”

But she still knows that, undoubtedly, there is still some abuse occurring that goes unreported to law enforcement. “Behavior change can take time. I know that there is a benefit to a batterer receiving this information and even small improvements can help a victim have a better outcome.

“If you don’t help him [an abuser] change, his partner may leave but he’ll find a new victim. Our goal is to provide enough information to help the batterer see his life can be better without the use of power and control. 

If you feel like you're trapped with an abusive partner, there is help available. Use our Get Help tool or Hope Chat in the bottom corner of your screen to find a local domestic violence advocate who is familiar with what you're experiencing and has access to resources that can help.