Diagram Of The Cycle Of Violence

According to experts, domestic violence never occurs abruptly. It goes through a defined cycle of events, a paradigm known as cycle of violence.

The model of a cycle of violence was presented by Lenore Walker and primarily consists of three important phases.

Honeymoon Phase: The cycle of violence starts and ends with this phase. This phase is characterized by feelings such as compassion, affection, love and apologies between the abuser and the victim. In this phase, abusers act differently after incidents of violence are over. Abusers tend to experience overwhelming feelings of remorse and sadness. While some tend to walk away from the situation, others seek pardon from their partners showering them with love, affection by presenting cards, flowers and gifts.  Some make promises or blame their inabilities for the cause of violence so as to get the partner back into the relationship.

Tension Building Phase: This is the second phase where the victim experiences a typical feeling of “walking on eggshells”. This phase is characterized by escalating tension between the partners that can often end up in outbursts, poor communication, emotional abuse, intimidation and threats. Tension can build up inside homes due to a variety of reasons including financial crisis, family pressure and employment stress. Victims tend to experience fear of violence and mostly try to calm the batterer down, so as to avoid any major violent confrontations.

Violent or Acting-out Phase: This is the explosive phase of the entire cycle where batterers resort to acts of verbal, physical and sexual violence causing serious emotional and physical harm to the victim.