NCJ Number
209499
Journal
Journal of Interpersonal Violence Volume: 17 Issue: 3 Dated: March 2002 Pages: 235-252
Date Published
March 2002
Length
18 pages
Annotation
Since previous research has not determined whether standard violence measures are appropriate for assessing violence in same-sex intimate relationships, this study assessed the structure of an expanded version of the physical violence scale of the Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) in a sample of randomly selected gay and bisexual men living in the West End of Vancouver, British Columbia.
Abstract
The current study was derived from a broader study, the West End Relationship Project (WERP), which was designed to document the experiences of gay and bisexual men in same-sex relationships. A total of 1,176 men participated in WERP's survey phase. Of this number, 300 men identified themselves as gay and bisexual. This was the target sample for the current study. A 14-item measure was developed from the CTS to assess participants' reports of having received and/or perpetrated physical violence. Five items assessed physical injuries that resulted from being physically attacked. A total of 284 gay and bisexual men reported they had received and/or perpetrated 14 violent acts in their same-sex relationships, both at any time in the past and during the past 12 months. Analyses based on item response theory (IRT) indicated that the physical-violence items form a unidimensional construct for receipt of violence ever in the past as well as for perpetration of violence ever in the past and in the past 12 months. The items were dispersed along the underlying violence continuum, from lower to higher severity of violence, and they discriminated well in this range. Implications for scoring the CTS are discussed. 2 tables, 1 figure, and 25 references