Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Family Violence (From Handbook of Family Violence, P 11-30, 1988, Vincent B Van Hasselt, et al, eds. -- See NCJ-113381)

• NCJ Number: 113382
• Author(s): S V McLeer
• Date Published: 1988
• Length: 20 pages
• Sale Source: Plenum Press
• Publication Type: Literature Review
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

After reviewing the extent and severity of various forms of family violence, this paper identifies psychoanalytic tenets in the family violence literature and discusses applications of psychoanalytic theory to family violence.

Abstract

The major types of family violence considered are child physical abuse, child sexual abuse, spouse abuse, marital rape, and parent abuse. The literature review focuses on the child abuse literature, starting with the early classic papers that define the battered child syndrome in 1967. This literature review is used as a prototype for describing the developmental unfolding of knowledge, skills, and attitudes within the field. One of the hypotheses confirmed is that a literature develops according to a specific sequencing in the percentage of certain kinds of publications found during a specific time period. Following the documentation of the literature's developmental phases, a content analysis examines the contribution of psychoanalytic theory and technique to the refinement of the knowledge, skills, and attitudes in the field of child abuse. In considering the applications of psychoanalytic theory to family violence, serious problems are noted regarding the generalizability and validity of the application of psychoanalytic models of mental functioning to problems as complex as those involved in family violence. 3 tables, 176 references.