Abstract
Much of the work on family violence, adult-on-adult violence, relies heavily on the characteristics of potential victims and offenders to explain the causes of violence. Family environment-related factors which can be represented by family organization, resources and stability have received relatively little attention. Those who live in a small family (or alone) may have a lower level of interaction with family members and a much lower risk of physical abuse compared to those living in larger family units. Also, the social organization or functionality of a family, which can be assumed from its structure and the relationships among its members, is likely to be related to the onset of violence. For those living in stable and wealthy families, violence may occur less often as a result of a reduced chance of conflict or family struggle. Findings of the current study show that the family environment differentiates the chances of victimization by family members.
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Notes
This process of building analysis data is possible through the NCVS code-builder in the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD). The interactive code-builder is an easy tool for selecting variables, sub-setting cases and structuring an analysis file. This can also be done manually, but the interactive code-builder makes it easier since it involves a series of choices to produce an SPSS syntax file.
Step-wise logistic regression is a useful tool for examining the impact of different variables. It is possible to determine automatically which variables to add or drop from the model with a step-wise process using either forward or backward methods. However, the data-driven methods of step-wise procedures contain the risk of modeling noise in the data. Thus, selected variables are included on a theoretical basis in the model using the ‘enter’ method to run the step-wise logistic regression.
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Kang, J.H. The Impact of Family Environment-Related Factors on Violence Against Adults in the Family. J Fam Viol 27, 303–312 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-012-9432-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-012-9432-6