A small sample study involving empathy, domestic violence in family units, and regarding women living in substitute housing/domestic violence shelters with their minor children. The study uses assessment tools to determine the adult strengths in empathy, attachment, as well as how the adult perceives their level of practice versus their level of knowledge of parenting skills with the minor child. The small study used twenty participants living in four different facilities in northwestern Illinois. In addition, the study was a completion of a university doctoral dissertation that was presented and defended at Aurora University in Aurora, Illinois in 2019.