Brigham and Women’s Hospital

This study examines the contributions of adult partner violence, childhood physical abuse and sexual molestation, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and partners’sub-stance use on poor women’s use of addictive substances. Utilizing a longitudinal data set, researchers found that women with histories of partner violence had nearly three times the odds of using illegal drugs at follow-up. Reverse causation (i.e., substance use increases the likelihood of violent relationships) did not explain the association. Con-founding by childhood sexual molestation and mediation by PTSD also did not fully account for the violence–drug use link. Partners ’ substance use was independently related to women’s follow-up drug and alcohol use. Program and policy implications are reviewed. Despite the proliferation of research on violence by intimates over the past 20 years (Gelles & Conte, 1990), basic information on the impact of violence on poor women’s lives is startlingly absent (see Browne & Bassuk, 1997, for review). Very limited research exist