November 11, 2026
Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a widespread and preventable public health problem in the United States, affecting millions of individuals and families each year.
Law and policy play a critical role in preventing and responding to IPV. Legal approaches vary considerably across jurisdictions and shape how health care providers, law enforcement, courts, and victim services respond to IPV. Understanding what these laws require, how they are implemented and enforced, and how survivors experience the systems they shape is essential to examining their role as public health interventions.
In this session of Legal Epidemiology at Lunch, researchers will demonstrate how legal epidemiology and complementary research methods can be used to examine IPV law and policy in the United States. Presenters will share research mapping key features of civil protection order laws and their variation across states and over time; examine how protection orders are implemented and enforced in practice; and explore survivors’ experiences navigating health care and criminal legal systems. Together, the presentations will highlight how scientific legal mapping, implementation research, and survivor-centered qualitative methods can deepen our understanding of how law and policy operate in practice, identify gaps between legal requirements and implementation, and inform future research and policy development.
About the Series
The Legal Epidemiology at Lunch Webinar Series explores methodological questions and emerging approaches in scientific legal mapping and legal epidemiology. Each session brings together experts from the Center for Public Health Law Research and guest researchers and practitioners using legal epidemiology methods in innovative ways, with an emphasis on practical lessons, methodological insights, and tools for conducting rigorous policy research.
