This article describes a revised Conflict Tactics Scales (the CTS2) to measure psychological and physical attacks on a partner in a marital, cohabiting, or dating relationship; and also use of negotiation. The CTS2 has (a) additional items to enhance content validity and reliability; (b) revised wording to increase clarity and specificity; (c) better differentiation between minor and severe levels of each scale; (d) new scales to measure sexual coercion and physical injury; and (e) a new format to simplify administration and reduce response sets. Reliability ranges from .79 to .95. There is preliminary evidence of construct validity.

The Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2): Development and Preliminary Psychometric Data

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(06)69523-8.pdf

Prevalence of intimate partner violence: findings from the WHO multi-country study on women's health and domestic violence

Background: Influential studies have cast doubt on the validity of retrospective reports by adults of their own adverse experiences in childhood. Accordingly, many researchers view retrospective reports with scepticism.

Method:  A computer-based search, supplemented by hand searches, was used to identify studies reported between 1980 and 2001 in which there was a quantified assessment of the validity of retrospective recall of sexual abuse, physical abuse, physical/emotional neglect or family discord, using samples of at least 40. Validity was assessed by means of comparisons with contemporaneous, prospectively obtained, court or clinic or research records; by agreement between retrospective reports of two siblings; and by the examination of possible bias with respect to differences between retrospective and prospective reports in their correlates and consequences. Medium- to long-term reliability of retrospective recall was determined from studies in which the test–retest period extended over at least 6 months.

Results:  Retrospective reports in adulthood of major adverse experiences in childhood, even when these are of a kind that allow reasonable operationalisation, involve a substantial rate of false negatives, and substantial measurement error. On the other hand, although less easily quantified, false positive reports are probably rare. Several studies have shown some bias in retrospective reports. However, such bias is not sufficiently great to invalidate retrospective case-control studies of major adversities of an easily defined kind. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that little weight can be placed on the retrospective reports of details of early experiences or on reports of experiences that rely heavily on judgement or interpretation.

Conclusion:  Retrospective studies have a worthwhile place in research, but further research is needed to examine possible biases in reporting.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2004.00218.x

Validity of adult retrospective reports of adverse childhood experiences: review of the evidence.

Meta-analyses of sex differences in physical aggression to heterosexual partners and in its physical consequences are reported. Women were slightly more likely (d = -.05) than men to use one or more act of physical aggression and to use such acts more frequently. Men were more likely (d =. 15) to inflict an injury, and overall, 62% of those injured by a partner were women. The findings partially support previous claims that different methods of measurement produce conflicting results, but there was also evidence that the sample was an important moderator of effect size. Continuous models showed that younger aged dating samples and a lower proportion of physically aggressive males predicted effect sizes in the female direction. Analyses were limited by the available database, which is biased toward young dating samples in the United States. Wider variations are discussed in terms of two conflicting norms about physical aggression to partners that operate to different degrees in different cultures.

/pdf/sex-differences-in-aggression-between-heterosexual-partners-2bwmfkidg7.pdf

Sex differences in aggression between heterosexual partners: a meta-analytic review.

This report presents the first global systematic review of scientific data on the prevalence of two forms of violence against women: violence by an intimate partner (intimate partner violence) and sexual violence by someone other than a partner (non-partner sexual violence). It shows for the first time global and regional estimates of the prevalence of these two forms of violence using data from around the world. Previous reporting on violence against women has not differentiated between partner- and nonpartner violence.

Global and regional estimates of violence against women: prevalence and health effects of intimate partner violence and non-partner sexual violence.

The present review involves the evaluation of 97 potential risk markers of husband to wife violence. Using 52 case-comparison studies as the source of data, markers were divided into four categories: consistent risk, inconsistent risk, consistent nonrisk, and risk markers with insufficient data. Based on this classification, it appears that a number of widely held hypotheses about husband to wife violence have little empirical support. Only witnessing violence in the wife's family of origin was consistently associated with being victimized by violence. Furthermore, it seems that characteristics associated with either the husband-offender or the couple have greater utility for assessing the risk of husband to wife violence than characteristics of the wife-victim. Findings are discussed in terms of the methodological and theoretical implications of current research on this form of adult domestic violence.

An analysis of risk markers in husband to wife violence: the current state of knowledge.

Dating violence: Prevalence, context, and risk markers.

Objective: To deal with the causal relationship between corporal punishment and antisocial behavior (ASB) by considering the level of ASB of the child at the start of the study. Methods: Data from interviews with a national sample of 807 mothers of children aged 6 to 9 years in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-Child Supplement. Analysis of variance was used to test the hypothesis that when parents use corporal punishment to correct ASB, it increases subsequent ASB. The analysis controlled for the level of ASB at the start of the study, family socioeconomic status, sex of the child, and the extent to which the home provided emotional support and cognitive stimulation. Results: Forty-four percent of the mothers reported spanking their children during the week prior to the study and they spanked them an average of 2.1 times that week. The more spanking at the start of the period, the higher the level of ASB 2 years later. The change is unlikely to be owing to the child's tendency toward ASB or to confounding with demographic characteristics or with parental deficiency in other key aspects of socialization because those variables were statistically controlled. Conclusions: When parents use corporal punishment to reduce ASB, the long-term effect tends to be the opposite. The findings suggest that if parents replace corporal punishment by nonviolent modes of discipline, it could reduce the risk of ASB among children and reduce the level of violence in American society. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 1997;151:761-767

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/PEDS/articlepdf/518458/archpedi_151_8_002.pdf

Spanking by Parents and Subsequent Antisocial Behavior of Children

Using the framework of patriarchal theory, the present meta-analytic review examined the predicted relation between wife assault and the maintenance of a patriarchal ideology. This relationship was evaluated using three measures of patriarchal ideology: (1) attitudes toward violence, (2) gender attitudes, and (3) gender schemas. Overall, assaultive husbands reported more positive attitudes toward marital violence and lower scores on masculine and feminine gender schema scales than nonassaultive husbands. Methodological factors accounted for the significant heterogeneity among the gender attitude effect estimates for men. A nonsignificant average effect in the males' gender attitude emerged in studies which used husbands' self-report data and case-control comparison groups. In contrast to men, assaulted wives held more feminine gender schema and tended to exhibit more liberal gender attitudes than nonassaulted wives across studies. These meta-analytic findings offer limited support for the ideological component of the patriarchal theory of wife assault and are discussed with respect to their theoretical and methodological implications.

David B. Sugarman

Papers

The Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2): Development and Preliminary Psychometric Data

An analysis of risk markers in husband to wife violence: the current state of knowledge.

Dating violence: Prevalence, context, and risk markers.

Spanking by Parents and Subsequent Antisocial Behavior of Children

Patriarchal ideology and wife-assault: A meta-analytic review