Problem Introduction

Emotional Violence against women in México

There is a popular Mexican saying that goes as follows: “How are the mule and the woman alike? A good beating makes both to obey”, this cruel phrase hides the terrible panorama in the Mexican society holding discrimination through rejection, social norms, and stereotypes towards women.

Violence towards women in México is no secret, according to the National System of public security, physical violence towards women increased by 43% in the last five years. According to the 2020 “Population and Housing” Census of the Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI), 51.2% of Mexico’s population are women, of whom 2 out of 3 acknowledge having experienced an incident of violence due to their gender, according to the 2016 National Survey on the Dynamics of Relationships in Households (ENDIREH); Recent studies by the International Labor Organization (ILO, 2019) show the negative economic effect of gender-based violence affecting almost 4% of the national Gross Domestic Product; Finally, it is estimated that thirteen femicides occur daily in México. Even though the problem is indisputable and multiple efforts had been done to confront this issue, there is no data collection or analysis that focuses on emotional violence towards Mexican women.

Psychological or emotional violence is the most prevalent among Mexican women, 40.1% claim to have faced indifference, intimidation and stalking throughout their last relationship (ENDIREH, 2016). However, it is alarming to know that almost 80% of women consider that psychological attacks are unimportant and therefore no help is needed. Understanding how different types of violence operate, is essential to generate prevention mechanisms for all who are on critical situations.

Objective

The purpose of this work is to do a statistical analysis of emotional violence towards Mexican women with data from the ENDIREH 2021 survey, by solving the next questions:

  • Is there a relation on emotionally violented women’s profile (age, gender, sexual orientation, income)?
  • Is there a pattern on the aggressor’s profile?
  • Are the aggressor’s characteristics significant to predict emotional violence?
  • Do Mexican women identify emotional violence?
  • Is emotional violence related to physical violence?
  • Is emotional violence related to physical violence in each state?
  • is there a pattern (level/type/occurrence) of psychological violence towards Mexican women?
  • Is there a pattern in house dynamics of women who suffer emotional violence?

The aim of solving those questions is to understand the patterns behind the characteristics of women who have suffered psychological violence; After analyzing the results, create suggestions of emotional violence aspects that are not being measured on the ENDIREH survey, to improve its data collection and, finally through a data storytelling, raise consciousness about the problem.