Wife Abuse, Husband Abuse, or Mutual Combat?: A Feminist Perspective on the Empirical Findings (From Feminist Perspectives on Wife Abuse, P 90-113, 1988, Kersti Yllo and Michelle Bograd, eds. -- See NCJ-119043)

• NCJ Number: 119047
• Author(s): D G Saunders
• Date Published: 1988
• Length: 24 pages
• Sale Source: Sage Publications, Inc
• Publication Type: Issue Overview
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: *This document is currently unavailable from NCJRS.

Annotation

In this chapter, the "battered husband syndrome" is examined and findings of a study on battered women's motives for using violence against their partners are reviewed.

Abstract

In some studies, researchers have found approximately equal rates of violence, both severe and nonsevere, committed by both husbands and wives. However, husbands had the higher rates of the most dangerous behavior; husbands repeated their violence more often; husbands were likely to do more damage because of size differences; women are economically trapped in marriage more often than husbands; and many women may use violence to defend themselves. The study reported in this chapter suggests that although women use violence as frequently as men, they usually employ it in self-defense. The content of feminist research, notably the assumption of women's oppression, the need for a gender analysis, and the use of complex explanatory variables were used while relying on the tools of more traditional, quantitative methods. 57 references.