The Trials and Tribulations of Testing Couples-Based Interventions for Intimate Partner Violence

This article considers the risks and benefits of couples’ interventions for intimate partner violence (IPV). Because current batterers’ treatment programs have been shown to be largely ineffective in stopping recidivism, there is clearly a need to experiment with novel approaches to establish empirically supported treatments for IPV. Previous studies testing the efficacy of conjoint therapy for couples experiencing situational violence have demonstrated promising results. However, most states mandate prohibiting testing these couples’ interventions in court-mandated samples. In this article, we describe a randomized clinical trial of the Creating Healthy Relationships Program (Cleary Bradley, Friend, & Gottman, 2011) for situationally violent couples in a court-mandated sample and the difficulties in conducting such an experiment within an established coordinated community response.