Exploring sub-Saharan African immigrant males’ experiences of gender roles and IPV in the US: A critical qualitative inquiry

Close intimate romantic relationships can be supportive and healthy, but they can also be depressing and elicit unpleasant emotions, increasing the risk of hurting loved ones (Heyman et al., 2015). Men and women experience suffering in different ways, and the word “victim” carries a bad connotation of being enslaved, powerless, and subservient. The current study investigates the perceptions and reactions of male immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) to intimate partner violence (IPV) committed by female partners, as well as their help-seeking behavior in the US, with an emphasis on gender dynamics and relationship conflict. Male SSA immigrants struggle to strike a balance between self-sufficiency, masculinity, and employment opportunities because of cultural customs and patriarchal ideologies. Using the IPV Stigmatization Model (Overstreet & Quinn, 2013), the effects of three different types of stigmas, cultural, internalized, and anticipated, are examined in SSA immigrant men who seek assistance for IPV victimization. The Acculturation Model (Berry, 1988) was employed to understand SSA immigrants’ choice of strategy for help-seeking. In this critical qualitative inquiry (CQI) study (Cannella et al., 2016), I explore the efficacy of victim services in identifying experiences of IPV and help-seeking in the lives of SSA male immigrants in the US. I employed interpretive qualitative research techniques (IQR), combining epistemology and ontology as the cornerstones of our research methodology. IQR employs an inductive approach, beginning with data and progressing to a theory that connects the data to the participants’ lived experiences (Bhattacherjee, 2019). I engaged a phenomenological approach using in-depth individual interviews to advance understanding of SSA male victims of IPV living in the US. Seventeen people were interviewed: 17 SSA male immigrants. Research findings indicate that SSA immigrant men experience IPV from their female partners, and they (men) rarely report the abuse. The research will improve our knowledge of male victims of intimate partner violence, especially those who are immigrants from SSA living in the US. The report will also help decision-makers find ways to address the problem.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Sub Saharan Africa studies

Grantor

Iowa State University - Thesis & Dissertation

Year dc:date.issued

2026

Author dc:creator

• Banda, Annie

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Zarling, Amie

• Human development and family studies

Language dc:language.iso

en_US

Repository record dc:identifier.uri

https://dr.lib.iastate.edu/handle/20.500.12876/106562

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dr.lib.iastate.edu:20.500.12876/106562