Wife Abuse in Tamil Nadu

Wife abuse is a major public health and human rights problem. Using an ecological framework, data from National Family Health
Survey (NFHS 2005–2006) of 3446 women were analyzed to determine the factors associated with wife abuse in urban and rural Tamil Nadu, India. The
prevalence rate of wife abuse in the year prior to the interview was 25.8% and was similar across urban and rural areas. Hierarchical
regression analyses revealed that in urban and rural Tamil Nadu, the micro level variables explained the highest percentage
of variance in wife abuse followed by the ontogenetic, the exo system, and the macro system variables. Some of the variables
that were significantly associated with wife abuse in Tamil Nadu were witnessing parental violence, drinking habit in husbands,
emotional abuse, patriarchal ideology, and positive attitudes towards abuse. Implications of the results are discussed within
the socio-cultural milieu of the respondents.