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Men who abuse women physically and emotionally can also sabotage their partners' control of birth, pressuring them to become pregnant against their will, new reports indicate. 

Several small studies have described this type of coercion among low-income adolescents and young adults with a history of IPV. Now, a report released Tuesday by the federal government funded National Domestic Violence Hotline says 1 in 4 women who agreed to answer questions after calling the hotline, said a member had lobbied to get pregnant, told them do not use contraceptives, or obliged them to have unprotected sex. 

The report is based on responses from more than 3,000 women, but it was not a research study, those involved said. 

"It was very telling," said Lisa James, director of health at the Family Violence Prevention Fund in San Francisco, who worked with the hot line in the report. "There were stories of men who refuse to use condoms, forcing sex without a condom, make holes in condoms, contraceptive pills in the toilet flushing. 

"There were a lot of stories about how to hide the birth control pills - that keeps" losing "their birth control pills, until he realized that he was hiding," added Ms James. 

One respondent described having to hide in the bathroom to take the pill. Another said that when she had her last period, the couple was "furious." 

The report of the phone line did not include a comparison group and did not collect information on participants, who were interviewed anonymously, and was published in a peer-reviewed journal. Was based on answers to four questions posed to 3169 women across the country, which in contact with the line of hot violence between August 16 and September 26, 2010, which were not in immediate danger and who agreed to participate. About 6,800 callers refused to answer questions. 

Of the respondents, about a quarter said yes to one or more of these three questions: "Does your partner or ex has told him not to use birth control?" "Does your partner or former partner ever tried to force or pressure to get pregnant?" "Does your partner or ex ever made to have sex without a condom to get pregnant?" 

One in six said yes to the question "Does your partner or former partner ever removed a condom during sex, to get pregnant?" 

The questions were designed by Dr. Elizabeth Miller, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the School of Medicine, University of California, Davis, whose previous work on reproductive coercion sparked interest in the subject. 

"It is very important to recognize reproductive coercion as a mechanism of control in an unhealthy relationship," said Dr. Miller. At the same time, he added, young women and girls dating older men may be confused by the pressure to become pregnant. 

"If you can put on the skin of a 15 years old, dating from 18 - or the man of 19 years of age who is not an unusual situation, and he says: 'Let's make babies beautiful together, "that is very seductive." 

But Dr. Miller said that more research is needed to understand the motivations of men. 

"One thing that appears a lot is: What are the ideas guys," he said, adding that his own research suggests some answers. 

"Some people have an intense desire for a nuclear family, and many who had experiences of a dysfunctional home family wants something better," he said. Some young men said, "I leave a legacy, and say, 'I'm not sure how long I'll be." youth gangs affiliated with the state that comes with having babies of several women. " 

Dr. Miller's paper, published last year in the journal Contraception, said that in five family planning clinics in northern California, one third of the 683 patients whose partners were physically abusive men said they had also pressed to become pregnant or had sabotaged birth control. Of 191 women who reported birth control sabotage, 79 percent also reported physical abuse, according to the study. 

The associations help explain why young victims of intimate partner violence are at increased risk of unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. 

Ms. James, the Family Violence Prevention Fund, said that despite the new emphasis on reproductive coercion, he doubted that was a new phenomenon. 

"Just do not think enough people have been asking the question," he said.