Mental Health Services in Safe House for Women and Children

Victims of Violence

Danny Sanjaya Arfensia

Faculty of Pscyhology, University of Airlangga, Surabaya, Indonesia

Keywords: Mental health services, safe house, victims of violence

Abstract: The large number of abandoned children as well as violence against women and children shows that

Indonesia is in an emergency. Women and children who become victims are experiencing security and

safety issues. Protection of women and children is done by various parties including the government. One

way that is done as a commitment to handle, pay attention, and provide assistance to women and children

who are victims is to build a Safe House. The Safe House sholud have a proper standard that ensure woman

and children in this location feeling safe, especially in maintaining the quality of their mental health. The

problem is the lack of government supervision, so the service quality is below standard.The study was

conducted on 12 people, including 9 residents of Safe House and 3 members of Safe House management.

Data collection was done by observation and interview method. The analysis is done qualitatively to get the

conclusion that match with the problem under study. This study found that there is a discrepancy between

the purpose of constructing a Safe House with the implementation of the handling of victims of violence and

abandonment, and also found that the quality of mental health services are substandard.

1 INTRODUCTION

The large number of abandoned children as well as

violence against women and children shows that

Indonesia is in an emergency. Cases of child abuse

in Indonesia have increased significantly since 2011

(Suyanto, 2010) . The evidence is from the number

of child abuse cases that received byCommission for

The Protection of Children Indonesia in that year

were 2,637 cases and 1,634 cases of themincluded as

sexual crimes. Meanwhile in 2013, the number of

child abuse reports received by Commission for The

Protection of Children Indonesiaincreased to 3,339,

while 52 percent of them were sexual crimes. The

increasing number of cases is very visible in 2014,

that only from January until September 2,626 cases

occurred. This also happens in cases of violence

against women. Annual notes launched by National

Commission on Violence Against Women show that

the amount of violence against women in 2016 is

really high (Suryakusuma, 2017) . In that year there

were nearly 260,000 cases. The data of violence

experienced by women is partly obtained from

related parties such as Religious Courts (359 cases)

and service provider partners found in 34 provinces

in Indonesia.

Violence against children can be defined as

physical, mental, or sexual violence. Some of which

include sexual assault, improper or undernourished

feeding, and neglect of education and health (Gelles,

1985) . Children whose nutritional, educational, and

health needs are not adequately met can be

interpreted as abandoned children. These children

become abandoned not just because they no longer

have one or both parents, but also because of

neglection, parental ignorance, incompetence, or

even deliberate.

Violence against women can be categorized as

domestic violence as well as sexual violence.

Domestic violence is the highest number of violent

incidents (Suryakusuma, 2017) . Domestic violence

can be physical, psychological, and economic. The

next category of sexual violence, most commonly

found in the form of rape, includes marital rape .

This violence since 2004 has been regulated in the

Law on Elimination of Domestic Violence article 8a.

Women and children who victims of violence

experiencing security and safety issues. Protection

against women and children is done by various

parties including the government. One of the ways

which is done as a commitment to handle, pay

attention, and provide assistance women and

290

Arfensia, D.

Mental Health Services in Safe House for Women and Children Victims of Violence.

DOI: 10.5220/0008588402900293

In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Psychology in Health, Educational, Social, and Organizational Settings (ICP-HESOS 2018) - Improving Mental Health and Harmony in

Global Community, pages 290-293

ISBN: 978-989-758-435-0

children who become victims is to build a Safe

House. Safe Houses that are part of this government

project are managed by the Ministry of Social

Affairs as well as the Integrated Service Center for

Women and Children Empowerment. Safe House

should have a certain standard . These standards

included standard operational procedures that could

be references to ensure women and children who are

victims actually gained safety and proper protection,

especially in maintaining their quality of mental

health. Whereas the initial purpose of making Safe

House itself is to be a temporary safe place for

victims both because the child and the women need

a temporary shelter or because their security is

threatened. Not only the facet of the quality of the

facility in the spotlight, but the quantity of the Safe

House facility is limited, a special obstacle for the

handling of cases of gender based violence so far.

The existence of this Safe House in the

protection scheme of women and child victims of

violence, is very important, because most violence

perpetrators are people who are known and close to

the victim. So that the security of victims after

violence occurs, becomes the main thing to do

(Fanani, 2016) . The emergence of the Safe House

also aims to provide continuous services for victims,

which has been a weakness in the ways of handling

victims in this case. Victims of this violence require

a time of recovery that is not for a while and must be

sustainable, so that should be Safe House a means

that can facilitate it. (Nadlir, 2018). This research is

trying to describe how is the service that gave by

one of the Safe House, so each party involved,

included government, can improve the service

quality so the real goal of build Safe House can

achieved.

2 METHOD

In this study, researchers conducted data from 12

people, including 9 Safe House residents and 3

persons from Safe House management. The

residents were women who victims of sexual crime,

and the other residents were children who

abandoned by their parents and live at the street

before. Their age range from 3 until 20 years old.

Data collection was done by observation and

interview method. The study was conducted over a

period of five months. The process of conducting the

observation is done by participatory and non

participatory method. Participatory observations

were conducted in order to find out how social

interaction and communication skills of research

subjects were towards people who were not

members of the Safe House. Non-

participatoryobservations were conducted with the

help of one way mirror observation media to find out

how the interaction and communication of research

subjects to othersubjects of Safe House. Interview

conducted on research subjects with semi structured

method with the aim of ensuring all data can be

obtained with the maximum without having to make

the subject feel uncomfortable during the process of

data retrieval. The whole process of data retrieval is

preceded by the process of providing a form of

willingness in which contains the procedures of

research implementation, research ethics, and data

protection of the subject of research, as well as the

rights and obligations that have been agreed by both

parties.

The analysis is done qualitatively to get the

conclusion that match with the problem under study.

The analysis was made by data-driven.The themes

were found by researcher, and analyzed from

inductive raw data. Researcher segregate the data

relevant to the objectives and focus of the study to

make a presentation that explains the condition of

mental health services in the Safe House as a whole.

3 RESULT

The study found that there were several problems

during the process of providing mental health

services in the Safe House. The problem arises from

several factors. The first factor is the type of Safe

House and handling experience on specific cases.

The next factor is the limited financing during the

process of providing mental health services. The

next factor is the factor completeness of personal

data of the victim and lack of understanding of the

methods of Safe House management in raising

awareness of the immediate family of the victim

about the recovery of the victim's condition to the

adaptation process.

The type of this Safe House provided problems

in mental health services in this location when the

Safe House included into the type which is basically

a safe house that provides services for adult female

victims. Safe House is a means that previously more

often provide a stopover for women who become

victims of violence, especially victims of sexual

violence, in the form of rape. Safe House is not

picky in receiving victims who need help so that

when the Safe House is receiving victims of

violence aged children, the organizers inevitably

accept the victim. This affects the ability possessed

Mental Health Services in Safe House for Women and Children Victims of Violence

291

by the manager of the Safe House in the face of

certain cases. Their expertise commonly used to

handle victims in adulthood, they also use to deal

with victims of the aged children. So that there is a

significant distance in the services provided and

certainly not necessarily will give a positive impact

on the recovery of mental health victims of child

abuse. Some found is when the manager of the Safe

House for dealing with problems arising from the

mischief of a child, it appeared that the manager

tends to provide treatment that is less instructive.

Suppose that when the children are lying, it will be

given lombok or chili so that children can tell the

truth. For children who are victims of sexual

violence, managers give the punishment of a messy

haircut, when the children begin to show the teasing

behavior of the opposite sex in the neighborhood or

sexual activity that is not normal. Researchers found

that the punishment activities were administered by

the Safe House in order to provide a deterrent effect

and reduce the confidence of the children when

meeting the opposite sex in the outer environment of

the Safe House.

The limitation of financing factor is also a

problem in mental health service at Rumah Am an.

One of the reasons is that this Safe House should

keep the confidentiality of the data of the victims

held in its place, so it is not possible to do promotion

to various parties to obtain financial aid. This forces

managers, especially counselors to seek funding by

working outside the Safe House, so that later can be

used to help finance the daily mental health services

in the Safe House, including for daily consumption

needs. The condition actually adds another new

problem where the victims should always get

supervision and assistance, especially since most of

them are still children. With managers who

eventually go to work outside the Safe House and

the number of managers is very limited, it will

automatically make the service to be less than the

maximum, and can even thwart the design of

services that have been made before because it is not

sustainable. The absence of managers at certain

hours is not yet equipped with the focus and

concentration of managers who will be divided in

handling case services in the Safe House. Those who

should be able to think of plans for subsequent

activities, eventually physically and mentally also

drained for daily financing in the Safe House.

Self data completeness factor becomes the next

problem in mental health service in Safe House. The

completeness of this data is very important to know

the growth of victims of the aged children. Data

such as weight, height, and medical history need to

measure the extent to which the medical

development of the child is medical. In addition,

under certain conditions emergency medical history

becomes important data, because it can help

managers to be able to provide appropriate services

and in accordance with the health conditions of these

children.

The communication factor with the closest

family of the victim is accommodated, also a

problem that can be highlighted from the provision

of mental health services in the Safe House. The

occupants of a safe house given this temporary

shelter should be able to become part of the

community again, to be adaptive, and of course can

interact again with their closest relatives. However,

the recovery process becomes difficult because of

the lack of ability of the manager to raise awareness

of the immediate family of the victim. Safe House

Managers are not equipped enough with sufficient

extension skills to deal with the situation. This is

also exacerbated by the closest family who really

strongly surrender all matters related to his child's

life to the SafeHouse. They seem to be no longer

willing to try to accept his son back and finance the

life and education of his son. Even some of the

closest families add to the burden of the Safe House

management by also entrusting their children or

other family members to Safe House for treatment as

well.

Behind the whole problem is actually the

manager of Safe House has been trying to provide

the best in recovering and improving mental health

of victims who are inhabitants of Safe House. The

Safe House Manager teaches the abilities necessary

for daily life, such as how to wash clothes, clean the

house, cook, read and write. Even the managers

apply a pattern of interaction and special

communication to the victims who become residents

in the Safe House. Managers teach them to interact

and communicate like a family. Discussion and

reflection activities in the morning are also applied

in daily life at Safe House. The residents are asked

to share their problems and apologize when they

have made mistakes. Managers also give the task of

rewriting what has been read to the children who

become residents there. Managers teach aspects of

religious knowledge to all residents of the

SafeHouse, either through online media or by

teaching reading Al Quran by working with one of

the related foundations.

ICP-HESOS 2018 - International Conference on Psychology in Health, Educational, Social, and Organizational Settings

292

4 DISCUSSION

From this research, it can be concluded that there is

a discrepancy between the purpose of constructing a

Safe House with the implementation of the handling

of victims of violence and neglect, and also found

that the quality of mental health services is less

standard. These things have many factors that affect

let alone in terms of government concern for the

program that has been made this. The government

should be able to better prepare for anything that

needs to be trained to the managers of the Safe

House, especially when faced with situations that the

managers have never met before. These trainings

will need to be periodically provided to Safe House

managers, so that they will have an ongoing and

actual insight and knowledge related to the handling

of cases of violence and neglect. Training on the

handling of children with special needs also needs to

be done, because these abandoned children may be

some of them abandoned by their families because

they lack physical perfection or have mental and

psychological limitations. So it can be said that the

non-conformity of mental health service delivery by

the Safe House managers is a result of their lack of

understanding and insight into what the right mental

health service is like. The government also needs to

survey the existence of houses used as Safe House

sites whether they have met the proper safety and

security standards. Obviously if it is found that do

not meet such standards, it is necessary to take

immediate action as soon as possible, so that the

initial purpose of the construction of Safe House can

be achieved well.

REFERENCES

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Perlindungan Korban Kekerasan Terhadap

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<http://www.konde.co/2016/06/rumah-aman-utama-

untuk-perlindungan.html> [Accessed 1 May 2018].

Gelles, R. J., 1985. Family Violence. Annual Review of

Sociology, 11, pp. 347-367.

Nadlir, M., 2018. Awal 2018, Tren Kekerasan Seksual

Terhadap Anak Laki-laki Naik. [online] Available at:

<https://nasional.kompas.com/read/2018/02/01/21041

771/awal-2018-tren-kekerasan-seksual-terhadap-anak-

laki-laki-naik> [Accessed 1 May 2018].

Suryakusuma, J., 2017. Darurat Kekerasan, Terhadap

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<https://www.dw.com/id/darurat-kekerasan-terhadap-

perempuan-di-indonesia/a-41422351> [Accessed 29

June 2018].

Suyanto, B., 2010. Masalah Sosial Anak. Jakarta:

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