ASPECTS OF EMOTIONAL DEPENDENCE,
ATTACHMENT AND MALADAPTIVE INITIAL SCHEMAS IN WOMEN VICTIMS
OF VIOLENCE
Intimate partner violence, Emotional dependence, Attachment, Early maladaptive schemas
Violence against women, particularly intimate partner violence (IPV), defined as a set of behaviors that can manifest themselves in physical, sexual, psychological or stalking forms, perpetrated by an intimate partner. It is the most common and prevalent violent act against the gender, statistics show that in Brazil, women represented 91.5% of total IPV notifications. It is a major public health problem and a violation of women's human rights. This research focused on risk factors that increase vulnerability and maintain violence in women receiving psychosocial care. The objective of this study seeks to verify the relationship between emotional dependence, attachment styles, initial maladaptive schemas and violence perpetrated by an intimate partner. To understand this reality, field research was carried out, with a quantitative-qualitative approach, at the Specialized Women's Assistance Center (CEAM), with a sample of fifteen women in situations of IPV assisted by the equipment. The research was carried out from the methodological perspective of Ecological Insertion and aimed at understanding the phenomenon of IPV against women based on the Schema and Attachment Theory. The data was analyzed in two stages: first through the investigation and study of qualitative data from interviews and field observations, through Bardin's content analysis and the second with quantitative data collection, based on the Scheme Questionnaires (YSQ – S3) and Emotional Dependence (CDE) on the attachment scale (ECR-R-Brazil) and sociodemographic data. The results showed the activation of Initial Maladaptive Schemas, mainly in the first domain (Disconnection and Rejection), the fifth domain (Supervigilance and Inhibition) and the fourth domain (Direction towards the Other), emotional dependence (ED) with the dimension of separation anxiety and expression affective and anxious attachment prevalent in the sample. And how these are risk factors that increase women's vulnerability and maintain women's vulnerability to IPV.