Motivational Interviewing for Enhancing Engagement in Intimate Partner Violence Treatment: A Quasi-Experimental Study

Abstract

The outcome of treatment for intimate partner violence (IPV) is hampered by high rates of nonattendance, drop-out, and low motivation or readiness to change. As a brief pre-intervention strategy, motivational interviewing (MI) can be used for perpetrators and those who may not yet be committed to active personal change. Previous research on MI as preparation for IPV intervention programs has reported mixed results. Further research is required to address the limitations in past research and to make a distinction between MI for IPV intervention engagement and MI for IPV behavior change. The current study utilised a quasi-experimental between-groups design. Two groups (control and MI) were compared to each other on the following variables: readiness to attend IPV intervention, IPV intervention commencement and completion, the number of sessions attended, the importance of changing IPV behavior, and the ability and commitment to change these behavior. The within-group analysis found a statistically significant result from pre- to post-MI, which was associated with a large effect size (p = 0.025, r = 0.64). With regards to the other primary outcomes, the results showed that the MI participants attended significantly more IPV program sessions (mean = 12.18) compared to the control participants (mean = 7), and also completed the intervention (60%) at a higher rate than the control condition (40%). Taken together, the current study contributed to the knowledge in this area by addressing gaps in the literature, by evaluating MI as a pre-intervention strategy for increasing engagement, and including a fidelity measure. The results suggest that well defined MI for engagement has promise as a method to increase male perpetrators’ engagement in IPV intervention.