Police training program utilizing serious game design
One of the main objectives of the ISEDA project is to improve police officers’ ability to interact with domestic violence victims through a victim-centered training curriculum. According to studies, women often report negative experiences when reporting to police authorities.
ISEDA will provide innovative hybrid and serious game module training through interactive learning in a virtual format. Participants will develop the necessary skills to better assess domestic violence situations and respond accordingly in the interview process and reading body language. This will provide better assistance to victim-survivors and a just treatment to their cases. Three pilot sites of Greece, Bulgaria, and Catalonia (Spain) will develop, test, and evaluate the training module.
Perpetrator Programs
The ISEDA project will promote and implement counselling treatment to perpetrators of domestic violence. This is intended to be an alternative to imprisonment, to prevent abuse and reduce recidivism. Such perpetrator programs have the potential to significantly increase the quality of life of both victim-survivors and perpetrators. A standardised IMPACT toolkit will be applied to effectively evaluate three perpetrator programs located in Cyprus, Bulgaria and Italy.
AI Chatbot
The project will develop an artificial intelligence conversational chatbot. The solution is based on ALIVE INTELLIGENCE from Sopra Steria. The chatbot will be used as a channel for seeking help, preparing for criminal proceedings, and reporting crimes. It will employ empathetic language and provide comprehensive information taking into account the context of how it’s being used (date, place of access), as well as situational information.
The chatbot will provide information about the available support services. This includes referring the victim-survivors to helpline numbers, police, or other first responders to de-escalate violent situations. The chatbot will also provide advice on how to collect and store evidence, and prepare for reporting the incident to the police. With victim-survivors’ consent, an integrated data platform will gather court-proof evidence, while ensuring safety and privacy ethics, to be used to build a legal case.
The pilot countries will provide valuable user experiences for further development. Catalonia (Spain), Greece and Bulgaria will test the use of the chatbot solution to finally propose a model, which can be replicated in other European countries.
Awareness Raising Campaigns
ISEDA will implement awareness raising campaigns in 7 countries to inform the general public and stakeholders about the different types of domestic violence and ways to prevent, detect and report it. The campaigns will also provide information on how to get help and assistance more accessible to victim-survivors through informational guides and brochures, informative posters, videos, and social media campaigns focused on national domestic violence challenges.
ISEDA will also develop preventive education programs which will be aimed at students and teachers in cooperation with educational institutions and youth centers. The aim is to sensitize young people to the problem of domestic and gender based violence so as to counter it early on.
Tampere University’s role in the project
Tampere University team’s role involves scoping of services in Finland, highlighting existing crime reporting technologies, training and prevention campaigns. The TAU team will support the facilitation and delivery of focus groups with the police, third sector and victim-survivors, as well as setting up an European Community of Practice.
Furthermore, TAU will explore and evaluate existing best practices and create evaluation tools and education and awareness raising programmes, in addition to promoting the policy implications arising from the project and preparing research papers.
Overall, the ISEDA project, employing multidisciplinary expertise and addressing the different aspects of domestic violence, has the potential to significantly enhance the fight against domestic violence on an European level and contribute to the establishment of the necessary robust long-lasting structures to eliminate it.