Perception of Intimate Partner Violence by Journalists in Lafia, Nasarawa state

Abstract Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a global problem, recently attracting enormous attention, owing to its effects on both perpetrators and victims. Journalists in the media world, are principal players in engineering the needed social change to reverse the tide of this menace. This study aimed to access how journalists practicing in Lafia understand the menace of Intimate Partner Violence. The study applied the use of validated structured questionnaire to collate information from registered, practising journalists in Lafia. Analysis of data was performed with Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20 using cross-tabulation to obtain frequencies and percentages. A total of 72 (48.3 %) out of 149 registered journalists responded to the questionnaire. Majority of the respondents which formed 70.8 % of the population practised in the electronic media, while the remaining 29.2 % of the population were print media journalists. Of this population, 61.1 % have practised journalism for 7 years and above, while only 6.9 % have been practising journalism for less than a year. Only 12.5 % of respondents had reported IPV stories before, while 70.8 % which formed a majority of the journalists have not reported IPV stories before, and 15.3 % were not sure if they had ever reported any IPV stories before. Of this reported IPV stories by journalists practising in Lafia, 22.2 % were murder and battery cases respectively, while abdication of marital responsibilities, physical abuse by husband, physical abuse by wife, physical abuse and starvation respectively accounted for 11.1 % of reported IPV stories by the practising journalists. The study recommends increased awareness among journalists to enable more impactful reportage of IPV in society, so as to stem the menace. Keywords: Intimate Partner Violence, Journalists, Media Coverage, Lafia, IPV Reportage, Public Awareness