Together to end violence against women in Tanzania: Results of a pilot cluster randomized controlled trial to evaluate preliminary effectiveness of interpersonal and community level interventions to address intimate partner violence

ABSTRACT

In Tanzania, women suffer high rates of intimate partner violence (IPV). We conducted a pilot cluster randomised controlled trial to test the feasibility, acceptability and preliminary effectiveness of IPV prevention interventions targeting men and communities in nine villages randomly assigned to one of three study arms (n = 450 couples). In the Control Group, women participated in savings groups while male partners received no intervention. In Intervention Group 1, women participated in savings groups and men participated in peer-groups addressing gender relations and IPV prevention. In Intervention Group 2, women participated in savings groups, men participated in peer-groups, and community leaders facilitated dialogues on similar topics. Recruitment was completed within one month with 95% retained in the intervention and 81% retained in the endline survey. Acceptability was high, with men participating in 82% of peer-group session hours. More men in Interventions 1 (24%) and 2 (19%) disagreed with wife-beating compared to men in the Control (13%); and more men reported non-perpetration of IPV in Interventions 1 (16%) and 2 (14%) compared to the Control (−2%). Findings suggest a fully powered RCT may detect significant reductions in men’s justification and use of IPV, paving the way for evidence-based violence prevention programming.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT02434796.

KEYWORDS:

• Intimate partner violence prevention
• gender-based violence
• couples
• Tanzania

Acknowledgements

We thank Maanasa Sosale Venkatesh, Chantilly Wijayasinha, Asia Ramera Brice, Jeanette Kaiser, Audrey Bruell, Abigail Morrison, Kelsey Sullivan, and Emily White for assistance with dataset preparation. NH conducted the quantitative analysis and drafted and finalised the manuscript, LM drafted and finalised the manuscript, LS assisted with the quantitative analysis, ES, EM, NR, LB, NH, MS and PK reviewed the manuscript and provided extensive comments on background, results, and discussion sections.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The Sexual Violence Research Initiative of the South African Medical Research Council: [Grant Number SVRI64-WEI2014] provided funding for this study. A representative of the funding organisation provided comments to the baseline report.