Professors at Buena Vista University do more than teach students. They also create for them. One professor is in the process of helping many potential college students by authoring two books. Professor of Psychology and Assistant Dean of the Graduate Program Dr. Wind Goodfriend is currently under contract with SAGE publishing to write two textbooks, one over social psychology and the other over healthy and unhealthy relationships. 

Goodfriend is no stranger to writing. Her first book was written as a co-author with Ms. Pamela Lassiter Cathey and was titled Voices of Hope: Breaking the Silence of Relationship Violence. This book covers many types of relationship violence including stalking, child abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, etc., and gets voices out there and let others know they are not alone. The book includes autobiographical narratives of people who have been affected by relationship violence who tell their stories and describe the impact of their experiences.

“We’re using these stories to try to educate the community about what it’s like to experience relationship violence and also to provide optimism to those experiencing it,” Goodfriend said. 

Goodfriend said there are two different phases of the Voices of Hope book. The first phase is to rise the hope in those who are victims of these tragic events. People in the education world sometimes write about relationship violence in less hopeful way., whether through depressing images or wording of how someone has been affected.

“If we can get people to be in an optimistic or engaged point of view, then we hope  the topic won’t be so hidden,” Goodfriend said. “And that we’re actually talking about it and it’s not a shameful thing to have experienced.”.

Phase two of the book is the current issues and how to get involved, as well as the research behind the autobiographical stories. This part of the book was written by Goodfriend.

“It’s a technique called narrative therapy, and it’s a literature review of what research went into the book that other people did, and then how we constructed our process that the authors went through,” Goodfriend, said.

Goodfriend explained that BVU is also the host university for the Institute for the Prevention of Relationship Violence (IPRV) since 2011. 

Voices of Hope: Breaking the Silence of Relationship Violence is now on Amazon Kindle, and iBooks.

For further information about IPRV’s initiatives or for speaking inquiries for Cathey or Goodfriend email: [email protected]