NCJ Number
114497
Date Published
1988
Length
10 pages
Annotation
Similarities and differences between spouses in their separate reports of the existence of violence in the relationship are being examined by means of a longitudinal research project that has already assessed 369 couples from Suffolk and Onondaga counties in New York.
Abstract
The couples were recruited by newspaper and radio announcements and represent a fairly typical sample of young couples from these two counties. They were about 24 years old and mostly employed fulltime. Interpartner agreement regarding the existence of violence appeared to be similar in couples about to be married and in distressed and nondistressed married couples. Two surprising findings were that the rate of aggression between partners about to marry was 35 percent and that reports of abusing a mate were about 5 percent higher than the reports of being abused by both males and females. Many reasons exist for both overreporting and underreporting of both aggression and victimization in a couple relationship. Separate interviews are now being conducted with partners to see if systematic reasons exist why men and women differ in their reports of spouse abuse. Reasons for disagreement are expected to include intention, intensity of the act, intoxication, memory loss, and self-defense. Cohen's Kappa measure is being used to take into account agreement with respect both to occurrence and nonoccurrence. Within 2 years, the research effort should produce findings about the reasons young married persons hit one another, how they interpret the hitting, and why they often differ in their reports of aggression. Tables, note, and 16 references.