Domestic Violence in Asian Immigrant Communities: A Scoping Review of Quantitative Literature

Background and Purpose: Domestic violence (DV) is a serious social issue that poses a significant threat to individuals’ well-being. Despite a substantial body of literature documenting a range of negative consequences of DV on individuals, research on DV among Asian immigrant communities remains limited. This scoping review aims to address this gap by reviewing and synthesizing the existing literature on DV among Asian immigrant communities. The overarching research question is: what is currently known about the issue of DV among Asian immigrant communities?

Methods: A scoping review was conducted to assemble the available, peer-reviewed quantitative literature on DV in Asian immigrant communities. A comprehensive search of 14 main databases across several fields, including Criminal Justice, Economics, Gender and Women’s Studies, Public Health, Social Work, and Sociology, was performed. Inclusion criteria were that (a) comprising a sample of Asian immigrants in North America, (b) measuring DV as either an independent or dependent variable, (c) being full-text publications written in English, and (d) being peer-reviewed quantitative studies. Initially, a pool of 1,180 studies was identified, and from this pool, a total of 31 studies were included in the final review.

Results: Four key foci emerged across the reviewed studies, including factors related to DV, the prevalence of DV, attitudes toward DV, and outcomes. Of the 31 studies included in the final review, nearly two-thirds (n = 21) examined factors that may be associated with DV. These factors were identified at various levels, including individual (e.g., childhood victimization and perpetrator's alcohol dependence), family (e.g., presence of DV among family members and lack of family in the U.S.), community (e.g., lower levels of social support), culture (e.g., acculturation stress and male-dominated cultural origin), and immigration-related (e.g., immigrant life stress and threats of deportation). Three studies identified protective factors that could potentially mitigate the risk of DV, such as ethnic identity achievement and victim’s fluency in English. In terms of prevalence, 13 studies evaluated the prevalence of DV, with rates ranging from 7-80%. Four studies concentrated on attitudes toward DV among this population. Finally, one study specifically examined the outcomes of DV among Japanese immigrants and found a link between DV and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Conclusions and Implications: The findings of this review suggest that while some empirical studies have investigated DV among Asian immigrant communities, the existing evidence is not comprehensive enough to provide a thorough understanding of this issue in this marginalized population. This study highlights several research gaps that need to be addressed. First, the majority of the studies (n = 13) used aggregated samples without considering heterogeneity across different ethnic groups. This approach may obscure important cultural and contextual factors that are critical to understanding the experiences of specific Asian immigrant communities. Second, only one study examined the outcome of DV, leaving empirical evidence about the consequences of DV, particularly long-term consequences, on Asian immigrants under-studied. Third, existing evidence lacks the exploration of protective factors and overlooks resilience among Asian immigrant survivors, which is a critical area for further research.