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Exposure to Interparental Violence and Childhood Physical and Emotional Abuse as Related to Physical Aggression in Undergraduate Dating Relationships

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Abstract

The present study examined whether witnessing interparental violence and experiencing childhood physical or emotional abuse were associated with college students’ perpetration of physical aggression and self-reports of victimization by their dating partners. Participants (183 males, 475 females) completed the Adult-Recall Version of the Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2-CA; Straus 2000), the Exposure to Abusive and Supportive Environments Parenting Inventory (EASE-PI; Nicholas and Bieber 1997), and the Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2; Straus et al. 1996). Results of zero-inflated Poisson (ZIP) regressions demonstrated that being female and having experienced higher levels of childhood physical abuse were associated with having perpetrated physical aggression at least once. Among women, exposure to mother-to-father violence and childhood physical abuse were related to the extent of dating aggression. Among men, witnessing father-to-mother violence and childhood emotional abuse were associated with the extent of dating aggression. Witnessing interparental violence and experiencing childhood physical abuse increased the likelihood that women would report victimization, whereas childhood emotional abuse decreased the likelihood that respondents reported dating victimization. Viewing father-to-mother violence and experiencing childhood emotional abuse increased the extent that men reported being victimized by their dating partners, whereas witnessing mother-to-father violence and experiencing physical abuse decreased the extent that men reported being victimized by their dating partners. Results suggest the importance of parent and respondent gender on dating aggression.

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Notes

  1. We modeled the interaction terms to determine whether the effect of childhood experiences on dating aggression were different between men and women. For pragmatic purposes, rather than interpreting the interaction terms, we chose to interpret the effects for men, which can be obtained from running a separate regression with men dummy-coded as zero, or from adding the main effect and interaction term together. For example, the main effect of father-to-mother is -.001, and the interaction is how different this slope is for men, which was .039. By adding them together, we get .038, which is the slope for men. Then, we exponentiate (e^.038 = 1.038), and now instead of interpreting the interaction per se, which reveals that the relationship between father aggression and dating aggression changes by a factor of .039 for men vs. women; we interpret what the actual effect is for men. These analyses are available from the first author by request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Old Dominion University, Room 250, Norfolk, VA, 23529-0267, USA

    Robert J. Milletich, Michelle L. Kelley, Ashley N. Doane & Matthew R. Pearson

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  1. Robert J. Milletich
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  2. Michelle L. Kelley
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  3. Ashley N. Doane
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  4. Matthew R. Pearson
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Correspondence to Michelle L. Kelley.

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Milletich, R.J., Kelley, M.L., Doane, A.N. et al. Exposure to Interparental Violence and Childhood Physical and Emotional Abuse as Related to Physical Aggression in Undergraduate Dating Relationships. J Fam Viol 25, 627–637 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-010-9319-3

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