Research Methodology

This section describes the research methods utilised to address the overarching research questions. It outlines the demographic characteristics of the sample surveyed, research design, measures, data collection processes and data analysis strategy.

Research Design

The 2021 Community Attitudes Survey (2021 CAS) is a modified version of the 2016 Community Attitude Survey (2016 CAS) that answers the research question/sub-questions. The 2021 CAS has questions about sociodemographic of respondents on their postcode, gender, age, ethnicity, educational level, employment status, and annual household income.

The survey also asks respondents about their perceptions of DV using close-ended questions (quantitative) and some selected open-ended questions (qualitative) about their knowledge of definition of domestic and family violence, its severity, and knowledge of gendered nature of domestic and family violence.

The survey also identifies attitudes towards DV, particularly around power in relationships, rape and sexual assault to identify attitudes towards victim blaming, minimising DV and excusing perpetrator behaviours. The 2021 CAS also asks questions about how members of the Wagga Wagga community would respond to DV situations and if they have seen/heard/participated in any of theDVproject:2650 activities. The 2021 CAS questions reflect the Wagga Wagga local context to personalise the survey to them.

The 2021 CAS was self-administered online, and survey link distributed by the Wagga Wagga City Council (Council) to target project sample number.

Perceptions of Wagga Wagga community members about DV

For the purposes of data collection, a self-administered online survey was constructed to identify the perceptions of the Wagga Wagga community regarding domestic and family violence to answer the research sub-questions outlined under “research questions”. The survey comprised 20 questions that related to demographic details and DV definition, attitudes/beliefs, theDVproject:2650, and how participants would respond to DV (explained further under “measures for online survey”). The questions were replicated from the 2016 CAS. The online survey was pilot tested with members similar to the intended respondents, with the aim of ensuring content and design validity.

After modifying and testing the online survey, it was administered to members of the Wagga Wagga community in NSW. The research questions, study participants, measures, pre-data collection procedures, field data collection procedures, challenges encountered in data collection and data analysis procedures are described below.

Research Questions/sub-questions

• What is the understanding or knowledge of the Wagga Wagga community about domestic violence? • What are the attitudes and beliefs that the Wagga Wagga community hold towards domestic violence? • How have these attitudes and beliefs towards DV shifted or changed since 2016 as a result of theDVproject:2650? • How would members of the Wagga Wagga community respond to domestic violence?

Participants for online survey

It was planned at the outset that in order to obtain a representative sample, the online survey would target 1,050 members of the Wagga Wagga community.

To compose the sampling frame, multiple organisations were contacted to assist in the dissemination of the survey link within their networks. Due to the snowballing of the survey dissemination, it was not possible to know how many individuals received the link. City-wide letter box distribution of the survey marketing material was also conducted, including villages in the Local Government Area.

Out of the total 1,286 individuals that logged onto the online survey; 1,268 partially completed and fully completed surveys were received from which 1,033 were coded and processed for data entry. From those that logged onto the survey 24 were disqualified as they were under 18 years old and 253 did not continue with completing the survey.

Measures for online survey

This section describes the measures used in the study. Respondents’ socio-demographic information was collected on their postcode, gender, age, ethnic background, highest level of education, current occupation, and income level. For information on the categorisation of the variables see Appendix A.

Open-ended questions throughout the survey allowed participants to share any additional information about their own experiences relating to DV.

Definition of DV

Questions were posed about how respondents understand DV and its severity, that included physical violence, sexual coercion, threats, verbal abuse, power and control, financial abuse, harassment, and use of technology.

Attitudes on DV

To gain an understanding of the perceptions of respondents on DV, questions were posed on common attitudes and beliefs towards DV and their level of agreement about them.

Response to DV

Everyone has a responsibility to do something about DV including members of the community. To understand what actions individuals would take in DV situations, questions were asked about respondents’ reactions to different DV situations.

theDVproject:2650

theDVproject:2650 was established as a primary prevention project in Wagga Wagga given the lack of such initiatives in the community, where most DV responses focused on crisis responses and tertiary interventions. To ascertain the effectiveness of the primary prevention campaigns of this project, questions were asked about whether respondents had heard, seen, or participated in any of the campaigns or activities that constituted the theDVproject:2650.

Pre-data-collection procedures

Procedures related to the construction of the online survey and pilot testing of the survey are presented here.

Description of Online survey

The 2021 Community Attitudes survey mirrored the 2016 Community Attitudes survey with some very slight modifications to wording/language to give clarity to some questions. Two new questions about theDVproject:2650 were added to identify if respondents had heard/seen/participated in theDVproject:2650 and to identify how they had heard about some of the campaigns/activities of the project.

Introductory Information Section An introductory information section (see Appendix A) was designed to inform participants about the study and allow them to make an informed decision about participating in the research. This included information on the survey aims, as well as on issues pertaining to confidentiality, anonymity, voluntary participation, informed consent, benefits of the research, and where to get help if needed. A mandatory question that required participants to check a box if they wished to proceed with the survey ensured only participants who provided consent could proceed.

2021 Community Attitudes on DV online survey Self-administered surveys play an important role in improving the response rate when investigating sensitive issues (Fink, 2006) and hence were appropriate for this investigation of DV. The survey lay-out was based on moving the respondent from the general to the specific, that is, from their demographic details through to items on each aspect of DV.

about understanding of DV and its severity. The questions that followed asked about attitudes and beliefs towards DV. The next set of questions asked about some possible responses towards DV situations. The final questions were specific to theDVproject:2650 participation and how respondents would have heard about the relevant campaigns/activities of the project.

Pilot: Design validity After the draft online survey was finalised on Survey Monkey, it was sent to six (6) individuals for comprehensive feedback on design; asking them to evaluate the ease of navigation, flow, completion time, overall format, design of the survey and comprehensiveness of instructions.

After a thorough examination of the feedback, the design of the survey was modified, certain sections reconstructed, and clearer instructions provided for each question. The time estimated to complete the questionnaire was 10 minutes depending on the amount of information respondents wished to share. The final survey was then activated online.

Field data collection procedures

Following the assurance of integrity of the online survey from the pilot study, the survey link was sent to multiple organisations for the dissemination of the survey. The online survey remained active for six (6) weeks. By online survey closing date, 1,286 partially- and fully completed surveys were received. From the survey responses, 253 cases were deleted as either the participants were below 18 (24 participants) or decided not to complete (229 participants) the surveys. A final 1,033 surveys were utilised for final data analysis once cleaned and coded.

Reminders to encourage participation

To boost the response rate, four follow-up social media posts were shared to encourage participation.