Evolution and study of a copycat effect in intimate partner homicides: A lesson from Spanish femicides
Entity
UAM. Departamento de Ingeniería Informática; UAM. Departamento de MatemáticasPublisher
Public Library of ScienceDate
2019-06-06Citation
10.1371/journal.pone.0217914
PLoS ONE 14.6 (2019): e0217914
ISSN
1932-6203DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0217914Funded by
The work by Torrecilla has been partially supported by Spanish Grant MTM2016-78751-P. The research of Liberatore has been supported by the Government of Spain, grant MTM2015-65803-R, and by the Government of Madrid, grant S2013/ICE-2845Project
Gobierno de España. MTM2016-78751-P; Gobierno de España. MTM2015-65803-R; Comunidad de Madrid. S2013/ICE-2845/CASI-CAMEditor's Version
https://doi. org/10.1371/journal.pone.0217914Subjects
Copycat effect; Femicides; Effect in Spanish; Censor; InformáticaRights
© 2019 Torrecilla et al.Abstract
Objectives This paper focuses on the issue of intimate partner violence and, specifically, on the distribution of femicides over time and the existence of copycat effects. This is the subject of an ongoing debate often triggered by the social alarm following multiple intimate partner homicides (IPHs) occurring in a short span of time. The aim of this research is to study the evolution of IPHs and provide a far-reaching answer by rigorously analyzing and searching for patterns in data on femicides. Methods The study analyzes an official dataset, provided by the system VioGén of the Secretaría de Estado de Seguridad (Spanish State Secretariat for Security), including all the femicides occurred in Spain in 2007-2017. A statistical methodology to identify temporal interdepen-dencies in count time series is proposed and applied to the dataset. The same methodology can be applied to other contexts. Results There has been a decreasing trend in the number of femicides per year. No interdependen-cies among the temporal distribution of femicides are observed. Therefore, according to data, the existence of copycat effect in femicides cannot be claimed. Conclusions Around 2011 there was a clear change in the average number of femicides which has not picked up. Results allow for an informed answer to the debate on copycat effect in Spanish femicides. The planning of femicides prevention activities should not be a reaction to a perceived increase in their occurrence. As a copycat effect is not detected in the studied time period, there is no evidence supporting the need to censor media reports on femicides.
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Google Scholar:Torrecilla, José L.
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Quijano Sánchez, Lara
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Liberatore, Federico
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López-Ossorio, Juan J.
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González-Álvarez, José L.
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