According to the Mental Health Foundation 1 in 4 women will require treatment for depression at some point in life. Women are 29% more likely to have been treated for a mental health illness than men and are also twice as more likely to suffer from anxiety as men. Mental Health Foundation suggests that the higher rate of mental health …show more content…
According to Nisonoff and Bitman (1979) they had found that one in four males had been reported in hitting their significant others. Even further into their study they had found that couples in their twenties and thirties had reported incidents of spouse abuse. Physical abuse can cause mental and physical problems for the woman later on in life. Spousal abuse links with depression on a mental level. The young girl can often feel neglected or lost which can lead to depression. An area for further study is to look at how this also affects the child later on. Hughes, Parkinsons & Vargo (1989) observes how not only the girl suffers from depression, but the effects of the child 's behavior and how that may link further to the single mother. Depression from the child’s mother can also cause depression for the child which can cause other issues in later years (Hammen, 1997).
Spouse abuse is not the only form of abuse a young mother can expect. There are times where the child is exposed to violence (Hughes, et al., 1989) that the child develops a tendency to treat their mother the same way. It can in some occasions lead to abuse caused either by witnessing events or by the other parent. The child can be pitched against the mother leading to the young parent being attacked by two fronts. On one side her abusive significant other and on the other, her child (Cunningham & Baker,