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Exploring the Indirect Effect of Preference Discrepancy on Intimate Partner Violence

  • Factors Related to Perpetration of Intimate Partner Violence
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Abstract

Preference discrepancy is the difference between partners’ ideal and real relationship, and is assumed to have a negative effect on the relationship. This study examines its effect on psychological and physical intimate partner violence perpetration and victimization, and hypothesizes this effect will be mediated through relationship satisfaction, communication quality and/or conflict resolution ability. A sample of 156 respondents participated in this study. Bias-corrected bootstrap analyses revealed indirect effects of preference discrepancy on psychological and physical violence victimization through conflict resolution. People with high preference discrepancy scores report lower conflict resolution abilities, and in turn, higher victimization rates. There was also a significant total effect of preference discrepancy on physical violence perpetration, suggesting high preference discrepancy increases the chance of using physical violence against one’s partner. Further investigation is thus recommended, to assess if preference discrepancy could function as an additional anchor in the prevention of IPV within couples.

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Notes

  1. Preference discrepancy is one possible conceptualization of the disconfirmation hypothesis (Goldstein 1962)

  2. Of the 76 clauses, only 72 were used to calculate the total sum score with. The four clauses concerning the domain children were excluded from further analyses, because there were too many missings on these variables in the Realization Form, due to the fact that about one third of the respondents did not have children.

  3. In this study we used an α of 0.05, that resulted in 95 % CI’s.

  4. Based on the norms reported by Olson and Olson (2000) on the basis of a national sample of 21,501 married couples (n = 43,002 persons).

  5. To produce a meaningful estimate of the average number of assaults in the final year, the mean must be based on just couples who experienced one or more violence events in the previous year. Thus, the chronicity statistics are the mean number of times the acts or events in each index occurred among those who experienced at least one violence act (Straus et al. 1996).

  6. When there was disagreement between the partners about whether or not violence occurred, we chose to assume that the violence had indeed occurred, considering the common and known influence of social desirable responding in this type of research due to the negative stigma associated with IPV (Sugarman and Hotaling 1997).

  7. The difference between the total and direct effect is the total indirect effect exerted through the mediators relationship satisfaction, communication and conflict resolution.

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  1. Leuven Institute of Criminology, KU Leuven, H.Hooverplein 10 bus 3418, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    Emma Jaspaert & Geert Vervaeke

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  1. Emma Jaspaert
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  2. Geert Vervaeke
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Jaspaert, E., Vervaeke, G. Exploring the Indirect Effect of Preference Discrepancy on Intimate Partner Violence. J Fam Viol 29, 829–837 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-014-9636-z

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