The numbers

In the study cohort, 43 women (3.9%) reported being threatened or harmed with a gun or other weapon by their partner. Another 171 (15.4%) reported physical violence without a weapon, and 726 (65.2%) reported psychological abuse.

The raw figures were stark. Across the observation period, 72.1% of the women threatened or harmed with a weapon had symptoms of panic disorder, and 62.8% had symptoms of PTSD. Among women who experienced IPV without a weapon, those figures were 45.2% and 39.2%, respectively.

First author Dr. Tyson Whitten, a senior research fellow at UNSW Sydney, said previous research had already shown an association between intimate partner violence and panic disorder or PTSD. This study went further.

"What is unique about this study is that we've been able to disentangle the contribution of weapon-involved intimate partner violence to these psychological disorders from the effects of other forms of IPV, which often occur in complex and overlapping patterns," Whitten said. "Through our analysis, we can see an actual temporal ordering that shows being subjected to intimate partner violence with a gun or other weapon led to an immediate increase in panic disorder and PTSD symptomatology."

How big was the effect?

Detailed longitudinal analyses showed that women who experienced actual or threatened weapon-involved IPV reported, on average, 0.6 more panic disorder symptoms and 0.7 more PTSD symptoms than women exposed to IPV without a weapon.

The within-person comparison was similarly revealing. When researchers compared symptom levels before and after a woman experienced weapon-involved IPV, the transition was associated with an average increase of 1.1 panic disorder and PTSD symptoms relative to pre-exposure levels.

"Taken together, these findings suggest that the association is not explained solely by differences between women who do and do not experience severe intimate partner violence," Rees said. "Deterioration in mental health — at levels associated with substantial distress and disruption to the ability to function in daily life — was also observed within the same women when weapon-involved IPV emerged over time."

The researchers also tested whether weapon threats or use were associated with increased symptoms of major depressive disorder and adult separation anxiety disorder. They did not find this to be the case.

What it means in practice

The findings carry implications for clinicians, policymakers and domestic violence support services, as well as for those shaping Australian gun and weapons policy.

"It's vital to recognize that nonfatal gun and other weapon use as a form of intimate partner violence represents an extremely serious risk to the victim's life, given the inherent lethality of the weapon and the documented patterns in which such threats are employed as tools of coercive control, too often preceding or facilitating subsequent homicide," Rees said.

The researchers recommend that routine assessments in suspected domestic violence cases explicitly ask about threats or assaults involving guns, knives and other weapons. Disclosure may identify women who need urgent safety-focused and clinical intervention.

"Greater integration of firearm and weapon regulation, family violence prevention and trauma-informed mental health care should also be considered, along with coordinated safety responses to reduce the immediate threat to life and the psychological consequences experienced by victim-survivors and their children," Whitten said.

The study followed a specific cohort — women recruited from prenatal clinics in Sydney and Melbourne — so the findings may not generalize to all IPV survivors. And with only 43 women in the weapon-exposed group, the researchers' statistical power for some analyses was limited. Still, the longitudinal design, which tracked the same women over up to a decade, provides unusually strong evidence that weapon-involved IPV itself drives a clinically meaningful rise in panic disorder and PTSD symptoms.

Publication details: Tyson Whitten et al., "Gun and Other Weapon–Involved Intimate Partner Violence and Psychiatric Symptoms," JAMA Network Open (2026). DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2026.36313