Introduction: Family as the most important social institution has been a major concern of cultures, religions, and nations. This social institution plays a key role in raising children and transmission of culture, customs and beliefs to future generations.Familial violence particularly when it is used against women results in disorders which prevent this social institution from playing its role as expected. One sort of familial violence is violence against women. Historically, from the beginning of human life on the earth, familial violence against women has been always  the case, in various degrees and severities depending on cultures and societies. Patriarchy is one of the traditional way of leading a family which in more cases ends in familial violence against women. The aggression of men toward women shows itself as a natural phenomenon in different ways such as being sensitive to the appearance of woman that in more cases lead to harassment. The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between patriarchy and familial violence against women.

Method: In the present study, data was collected through a questionnaire was filled in by 194 married women living in Koohdasht. Stratified and systematic sampling were used to select participants.

 A researcher-designed questionnaire was used to collect data. The validity was confirmed by content validity and stability of the questioner was assessed by Cronbach's alpha test that its rate for familial violence against women was 0.890 and its rate for patriarchy was 0.685. Data was analyzed using SPSS 21. So, for describing data we used frequency percentage and for explanation of data we used Pearson’s correlation coefficient and then analyzed multiple regressions and analyzed the variable path.       

Findings: According to descriptive findings, the average age of respondents was 35.44. Considering their level of literacy, 21.7 were illiterate and 78.3 were literate. Among the four dimensions of violence (mental, physical, financial and sexual), mental violence was found to be the highest type (with average of 29.28 percent) and sexual violence was found to be the lowest type (with average of 13.22 percent). Results of a Pierson analysis on data indicated a positive correlation and a meaningful relationship between patriarchy and familial violence against women. So, that men with stronger patriarchal beliefs use more violence against women than those with moderate patriarchal beliefs. While there was a positive correlation between education,age, and familial violence women, it was not meaningful relationshipe.  

Discussion: Findings of the study suggests that behind familial patriarchy is the wrong popular belief that equality between men and women is equal to the downgrading of men’s status. These wrong beliefs contribute to the continuing dominance of the patriarchal culture in family and society and pave the way for increasing violence against women. Since the family is the first environment in which the character of children is formed and the children idolize their parents and other adults, the dominant atmosphere of family and the behavior of parent influences on the behavior of children in their future families. As an example the son of such family learns that for achieving its demands use violence against his wife and children. And girls learn from fathers' patriarchal behaviors to be more submissive so that they come to see violence a natural right of men.  So it is recommended that families be made aware of consequences of patriarchy through education and consciousness raising via different tools such as media and social networks. As a result of decreasing degrees of patriarchy we can hope that violence against women will be reduced considerably and making the family a cozy context for woman and children too.