Influence of Stress Related Factors on the Occurrence of Physical Violence among Relational Couples in Nakuru County

There is a growing concern on violence that is domestically instigated being among the most frequent forms of abuse among relational couples. Intimate partners appear the frequent perpetrators of domestic violence against women. Abuse of Physical nature in relationships that is intimate is often supplemented by abuse of psychological nature and between a third and over a half of cases is made by sexual abuse. Majority of partners especially women that are victims of physical violence in general experience multiple acts of aggression over time. There was need to conduct a study where the objective was to investigating influence of stress related factors on the occurrence of physical violence among relational couples in Nakuru County. The study was anchored on social learning theory. The study adopted descriptive research design targeting victims of physical abuse attended to in rescue centers, counselors attending to them and gender officers within Nakuru County. Multistage sampling technique was used to arrive at 146 respondents which was a sample which comprised of 60 physical violence victims, 8 gender officers and 12 counselors. Collection of data was through questionnaires for the victims and Key Informants (KI) interviews. Karl Pearson Correlation test at 5 % levels of significance, the resultant correlation coefficient was 0.819 with a p - value being 0.000. Pearson Chi-Square test at 5 % levels of significance that yielded χ2(16, n = 52) = 30.672, p = 0.011 < 0.05. The study recommends that couples should work on stress management techniques so as to avoid directing the stress to physically violating each other.All stakeholders which includes the government, church and society should work together to condemn physical violence or any other form of gender violence by coming up with significant intervention measures