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Intimate violence : Hitchcock, sex, and queer theory 1st

Edition David Greven

Intimate Partner Violence: An Evidence-Based Approach Rahn

Kennedy Bailey

Researching Gender Violence and Abuse Theory Methods

Action 1st Edition Nicole Westmarland

Business Against Intimate Partner Violence: A Case of

Participatory Action Research and Social Action Melsa
Ararat
Health Inequities Related to Intimate Partner Violence
Against Women The Role of Social Policy in the United
States Germany and Norway 1st Edition Mandi M. Larsen
(Auth.)

Queer Families in Hungary : Same-Sex Couples, Families of

Origin, and Kinship Rita Béres-Deák

Intimate Relationships in Cinema Literature and Visual

Culture A. Schwenkenbecher

Partnerships families and communities in early childhood

Wilson

Child Abuse and Neglect in Uganda 1st Edition David Kaawa-

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i

Intim ate V iolence a nd A buse in Fa milies

ii
iii

Intimate Violence and Abuse

in Families
Fourth Edition

Richard J. Gelles

1
iv

1
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press

198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America.

© Oxford University Press 2017

First Edition published in 1985

Second Edition published in 1990
Third Edition published in 1997
Fourth Edition published in 2017

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in

a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction
rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above.

You must not circulate this work in any other form

and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.

Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data

Names: Gelles, Richard J., author.
Title: Intimate violence and abuse in families /​Richard J. Gelles.
Other titles: Intimate violence in families
Description: Fourth edition. | Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press,
[2017] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016010563 | ISBN 9780195381733 (alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Family violence—​United States.
Classification: LCC HV6626.2 .G45 2017 | DDC 362.82/​92—​dc23
LC record available at https:// ​lccn.loc.gov/​2016010563

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed by WebCom, Inc., Canada
v

To:
Murray Arnold Straus
Staci Peckham Perlman
vi
vii

Contents

Preface ix

1. Introduction to Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families 1

2. The Historical and Cultural Legacies of Family and Intimate Violence 18
3. The Youngest Victims: Violence Toward and the Maltreatment
of Children and Adolescents 44
4. Violence Against Women in Heterosexual Relationships 71
5. Mutual Violence; Violence Toward Men; Violence in Gay, Lesbian,
and Transgender Relationships 93
6. Hidden Victims 109
7. Explaining Intimate Violence and Abuse 128
8. Policy, Intervention, and Prevention: Society’s Response to Intimate
Violence and Abuse 146

Appendix 171
References 173
Author Index 193
Subject Index 199

vii
viii
ix

Preface

In the early fall of 1971, I dropped by Murray Straus’s office at the University
of New Hampshire. I was a second-​year doctoral student in the Department of
Sociology and Murray was a full professor. I was making the rounds of the faculty
trying to decide on a topic for my doctoral dissertation and trying to match a
topic to the proper advisor.
Frankly, I had low expectations when I asked Murray if he would have lunch
with me. Murray was an established scholar in the field of family sociology with
a specialty in quantitative measurement. I saw myself as a qualitative researcher
and had done a participant-​observation study of television news for my master’s
thesis.
I had enough knowledge of Murray’s work to know that his most recent project
was a laboratory study of family decision making. As much as I respected Murray
as a teacher and scholar, I could not see how our interests could possibly align.
Lunch produced short-​term and long-​term unexpected results. First, Murray
described his new research project on “family violence.” He was co-​editing a book
on violence in the family with Suzanne Steinmetz (Steinmetz & Straus, 1974).
In addition, he was distributing questionnaires to college students seeking re-
sponses to questions about their experience with, and observations of, violence
in their homes.

ix
x

x      Preface
I was fascinated by the challenge of actually trying to conduct research on
violence between family members. Here was a scholar who was willing to ask
the question, “Have you stopped beating your wife?” On the other hand, I was
not much of a fan of quantitative research. I opined that, as much as I admired
Murray’s approach of surveying college students, I had concerns that the field of
“the sociology of the family” was actually “the sociology of the family of American
college students.”
Murray tolerated my youthful impudence and was intrigued by the possibility
of someone being willing to carry out research in the community through in-​
depth interviews. So, I left lunch with a dissertation topic and a major professor.
What I did not realize is that I left lunch with a career. Thinking only short-​term,
I just assumed I had a dissertation topic and that was it. But like so many others
who came into the field of intimate violence and abuse, I discovered that the topic
begins to own you. The emotional aspects of seeing and talking to victims of inti-
mate violence is heartbreaking. The challenges of trying to find meaningful help
for victims and offenders is frustrating. The indifference of policy-​makers to the
tragedies that befall victims was, and often continues to be, infuriating. Lastly,
conducting quality and useful research continues to be challenging.
It took a bit longer to come face to face with the next unexpected outcome
of my lunch. Our program of research evolved into the design and carrying out
of the First National Family Violence Survey in 1976. After we collected data
from a nationally representative sample of 2,146 individuals, Murray, Suzanne
Steinmetz, and I set out to prepare presentations and publications based on
our data. I worked on violence against children, Murray analyzed the data on
violence between intimate partners, and Suzanne examined the sibling violence
data. Things were relatively quiet at my end, although a goodly number of schol-
ars were taken aback by our conclusions that nearly 2 million parents used abu-
sive physical violence toward their children each year.
The reactions to Murray and Suzanne’s work were considerably more heated.
Murray presented a paper and then published that same paper on intimate part-
ner violence. The paper presented data that showed that slightly more women
struck their male intimate partners than men struck women. For each form of
severe violence, with the exception of “using a gun or knife,” the frequency of
female-​to-​male violence exceeded the rate of male-​to-​female violence. In the very
same journal where Murray published his statistical data (1977), Suzanne pub-
lished her article, “The Battered Husband Syndrome” (1977a). Suzanne’s paper
was considered so controversial that the editors commissioned a critique of the
paper that was published in the same issue.
xi

Preface      xi
Perhaps I was a bit young and naïve, but I was surprised by the controversy
stirred up by the data on female-​to-​male violence. These were the data. We did
not make the data up; this is what our respondents had told us. There was no
malice in our research, no hidden agenda. So why the uproar?
Well, I quickly learned that there are fault lines that exist between research,
practice, policy, and advocacy. Advocates, struggling to have their voices heard
by policy makers, embraced the data on violence toward women, but believed
the data on violence towards men severely undercut their claims that violence
against women deserved a special place on the social policy agenda and deserved
funding from federal and state sources.
Over the years, I discovered that such fault lines and controversies are not
confined to the field of intimate partner violence. When I first published my
critique of intensive family-​preservation programs, I ran into a buzz saw of
controversy. What was the problem? I asked. The answer was that funding for
family preservation programs was a critical resource practitioners depended
on as they worked to preserve families in which child maltreatment occurs.
Well, I countered, maybe some families are not worth preserving. That set
off another explosion: “Don’t you realize that minority families are dispro-
portionately affected by child welfare policies?” The families I thought were
not “worth” preserving were likely to be disproportionately minority and
low-​income families. Clearly, gender and race are at the core of controver-
sies regarding many social problems, and intimate violence and abuse are no
exception.
In this, the fourth edition of Intimate Violence and Abuse, I do not avoid the
controversies. My goal is to be inclusive of all the disciplines and constituencies
involved in the efforts to explain, predict, understand, and prevent intimate vio-
lence and abuse. I try to be respectful of all points of view and present the differ-
ent points of view that surround some of the key contentious issues in the field
on intimate violence and abuse. If I am guilty of a bias, it is that I draw upon the
best available research and data to settle a controversy.
This volume is designed to be a core text for students examining intimate
violence and abuse. As a core text, the book serves as a launching pad for stu-
dents who wish to explore one or more aspects of intimate partner violence at a
deeper level.
In the 40 years since I sat down for lunch with Murray Straus, the field of
intimate violence and abuse has become a rich and exciting field of endeavor
for scholars, teachers, advocates, practitioners, and policy-​m akers. While we
still clash politely, and sometimes not so politely, those of us in the field can
xii

xii      Preface
take some satisfaction that our collective efforts have not just contributed
to a larger knowledge base, but, as you will read in the chapters that follow,
we have actually contributed to a reduction in the level of intimate violence
and abuse.

Richard J. Gelles, Ph.D.

October, 2015
xiii

Intim ate V iolence a nd A buse in Fa milies

xiv
1

1 Introduction to Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

Twenty or thirty years ago, a book on the topic of intimate or family vio-
lence would always begin with introduction that made the case that, while vio-
lence and abuse between intimates has occurred across time and cultures, such
behavior is generally not thought of as a major social problem. Such an introduc-
tion is no longer necessary. News and social media accounts about some form of
family violence are common, and hardly a day goes by without one or more cases
coming to public attention. For intimate partner violence, the media accounts
focus chiefly on reporting on violence perpetrated by public celebrities or sports
figures. After Ray Rice, a star player with the National Football League’s (NFL)
Baltimore Ravens, was arrested for assaulting his fiancée, the National Football
League instituted a new policy that called for a six-​game suspension for any pro-
fessional football player found to have perpetrated domestic violence against a
partner. The six-​game suspension is for the first offense. A player with a second
offense will be banished for life—​w ith the right to appeal after one year. The
policy, which is a component of the NFL’s personal conduct policy, was imple-
mented by the NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell after he was widely criticized
for imposing only a two-​game suspension penalty on Rice, who was shown on

1
2

2      Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

a video dragging his unconscious fiancée (and later wife) out of an elevator in
Atlantic City. Three days after the commissioner instituted the new policy, a San
Francisco 49ers player was arrested on suspicion of felony domestic violence.
When a second video emerged in September 2014 showing Rice punching his fi-
ancée and her falling to the floor of the elevator unconscious, the commissioner
banned Rice from playing, and the Ravens released Rice.
Domestic violence receives considerable attention on the sports pages of
papers and websites, as it does on entertainment pages when celebrities are
involved. Olympic sprinter Oscar Pistorius was tried for killing his girlfriend,
Reeva Steenkamp. Pistorius was acquitted of premeditated murder but convicted
of “culpable homicide.” Others charged with some form of domestic violence in-
clude actor Charlie Sheen and rapper/​producer Chris Brown. Celebrity victims
have included actresses Halle Berry and Pamela Anderson, television personality
Meredith Viera, and singers Rihanna and Tina Turner.
The public portrayal of child maltreatment—​both physical abuse and neglect—​
comes largely in the form of news reports of horrific cases. Most news reports of
child maltreatment are local stories that involve newborns or infants killed by
caregivers.1 When older children are victims, the news reports tend to portray
victims of cruel torture or starvation. The public reporting of child maltreatment
cases heavily over-​represents minority families living in poverty.
A second form of child-​maltreatment reporting involves the same poor and
minority families, but concentrates on the failure or inadequacies of the local
or statewide child welfare system. The Miami Herald published a horrifically
graphic series titled “Innocents Lost” that detailed the cases of numerous chil-
dren who died after they and their families became involved in the Florida child
welfare system. Similar series have appeared in the Washington Post, Philadelphia
Inquirer, New York Times, and Arizona Republic. The Public Broadcasting Service
(PBS) show Frontline broadcast a multi-​part series of the functioning of the
Maine child welfare system. The show began with the case of a child killed by
her foster mother, who was an employee of the Maine child protective service
system.
While a book on intimate violence and abuse probably does not have to make
the case that child maltreatment and intimate partner violence are important
social problems, it seems obvious that some of the media presentations of inti-
mate violence tend to over-​represent one segment of the problem. Celebrities are
neither the only perpetrators nor the only victims of intimate partner violence,
and child maltreatment is not confined to poor and minority families. In addi-
tion, important forms of intimate violence and abuse are almost completely over-
looked. Violence between siblings, abuse of the elderly, child-​to-​parent violence,
3

Introduction      3
and violence among gays, lesbians, and transgendered couples are nowhere to be
found in public media.
When the topic of sexual abuse is presented in the news media or film, perpe-
trators are typically the clergy, daycare providers, or choir or scout troop leaders.
Family members, who make up the vast majority of sexual abuse perpetrators,
are rarely covered or portrayed in movies.
While it is not new or news that intimates can be violent or abusive, there is
considerable material to cover on the topic—​beyond making the case that inti-
mate violence is a problem that calls for public, policy, and practice attention. This
book is designed to provide a basic overview of the subject of intimate violence
and abuse. Many books look at only one aspect of violence and maltreatment in
the home. Typically, an author will focus on only intimate partner violence, child
abuse and neglect, sexual abuse and victimization, or elder abuse (there are very
few books on sibling violence or child-​to-​parent violence).
The single focus is also found in professional journals. There are journals with
the titles of Child Maltreatment; Child Abuse and Neglect: The International Journal;
Violence Toward Women; Partner Abuse; and the Journal of Elder Abuse and Neglect.
A few journals, such as Journal of Intimate Violence, Journal of Family Violence, and
Violence and Victims, among others, do publish articles on a full range of intimate
violence.
Policy and advocacy also tend to be developed around single aspects of inti-
mate violence. Enactment and oversight of the federal Violence Against Women
Act (Public Law 103-​322) is located with the Senate and House of Representatives
judiciary committees. The Senate Finance Committee and the House Committee
on Ways and Means oversee the major child welfare legislation that funds
child welfare services (Title IV-​E of the Social Security Act of 1935). Each form
of intimate violence has its own advocacy organizations—​for example, the
Family Violence Prevention Fund (now titled Futures Without Violence) for
intimate partner violence, and the Child Welfare League of America for child
maltreatment.
Finally, practice dealing with such abuses is also compartmentalized. The
Children’s Hospital of Boston developed separate teams to assess and respond
to specific forms of child maltreatment. There was a Trauma X team for physical
child abuse, a Failure to Thrive team for suspected neglect, and a Sexual Abuse
team. Social service agencies also tend to “silo” or compartmentalize programs
and interventions for specific categories of violence, abuse, and maltreatment.
The compartmentalization of research, policy, practice, and advocacy may
function well for the goals of each group, but it artificially segments the reality of
what goes on among intimates and families. Moreover, the compartmentalization
4

4      Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

may obscure the entire picture and hinder better and more effective prevention
and treatment approaches.
An example of the problems produced by narrowly focusing on just one form
of violence and abuse is illustrated by the experience of one hospital’s emergency
room staff. The physicians and nurses in an inner-​city children’s hospital treated
a two-​year-​old boy for bruises and a possible concussion. The case came into
stark focus when the examining physician realized that the bruise on the boy’s
face was in the form of the outline of a hand, and that there was a clear indication
of an injury caused by a ring on one of the fingers. The physician approached the
mother of the boy, who was also in the waiting room, and asked her to hold out
her hand. The ring on the mother’s finger matched the injury on the little boy’s
face. The physician began to raise his voice to the mother, accusing her of inflict-
ing the injury and telling her in no uncertain terms that he would report the case
to Child Protective Services and hold the child in the hospital rather than release
the boy to the clearly abusive mother. One of the nurse practitioners stepped
forward and pulled the physician away. She asked the doctor whether he noticed
that the mother also had bruises on her face and around her eyes. While there
was little doubt that the mother had injured the child, there was also the likeli-
hood that the mother was a victim of some sort of violence—​perhaps inflicted
by an intimate partner. While the suspected abuse of the child would have to be
reported, the victimization of the mother should also be a concern for the emer-
gency room staff.
Research does in fact find that one form of intimate violence is often related
to another. There is a considerable correlation between the abuse of children and
intimate partner violence (Edleson & Graham-​Bermann, 2001; Gelles & Straus,
1988; Renner & Slack, 2006). There is less clarity in terms of what the appropri-
ate interventions and policies should be when there are multiple victimizations
in a home.
An example of social policies’ being at cross-​purposes arose in a lawsuit filed
in New York City. The case, Nicholson v. Scopetta, arose in 1999 when Sharwline
Nicholson ended her relationship with the father of her child. Her former part-
ner assaulted Ms. Nicholson, and the resulting injuries required her to be hospi-
talized. Ms. Nicholson provided the child protective workers from the New York
City Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) with names of relatives who
could care for the children, but the ACS decided to seek legal custody of the
children because they were in imminent danger. The argument was that Ms.
Nicholson could not protect herself or her children. The children were placed in
foster care. Later, Ms. Nicholson and others filed a class-​action suit against ACS,
claiming that taking her children from her when she had done no harm to them
5

Introduction      5
violated her constitutional rights. Advocates for battered women, as well as ad-
vocates for parents, lined up on the side of Ms. Nicholson and the other plain-
tiffs in the lawsuit. Others worried that, even though Ms. Nicholson had not
hurt her children, they were in a dangerous environment, and returning them
to Ms. Nicholson could have compromised their safety. In the end, the New York
Court of Appeals ruled that a mother’s inability to protect her child was not, in
and of itself, “neglect” and could not be the sole factor leading to a removal.
And so, at every level—​research, social services, and policy, forms of family
violence, perpetrators, and victims intersect.

Myths and Controversies That Hinder the Understanding

of Intimate Violence and Abuse

Advocacy Statistics

As we will discuss in Chapter 2, intimates and family members have been vio-
lent and abusive toward one another across time and cultures. But for most time
periods and most cultures, the problem of intimate violence and the abuse of
children occurred in private and was very much what sociologist C. Wright Mills
(1959) called a “private trouble.” Many victims were too young or dependent to
seek help, while other victims were too scared or incapacitated to reach out for as-
sistance. The threat of victim-​blaming kept many other victims silent. One of the
necessary steps that must occur before a “private trouble” becomes a social issue
is for there to be some kind of public recognition that the private trouble affects
a significant number of individuals. Secondly, the private trouble must generate
significant negative consequences for individuals and society.
Child advocates, feminists, and women’s rights advocates played the lead roles
in identifying intimate violence and abuse as social issues and important social
problems. To make the case about the harm violence and abuse caused, advocates
relied on graphic and horrific case examples, often accompanied by photographs.
But advocates faced a major roadblock in establishing the case that intimate vio-
lence and abuse were widespread. Until the mid-​1970s, there was no research at
all on the extent of child abuse, sexual abuse, intimate partner violence, or elder
abuse. In the mid-​1970s, as a result of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment
Act of 1974 (Public Law 93-​247), Congress mandated that the states keep track
of child abuse and neglect reports. The mandate was a requirement that had to
be fulfilled in order to receive federal funds, but not all states initially complied
with the mandate. The same law called for a national survey of the incidence of
child maltreatment. The incidence study would not be completed and published
6

6      Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

until 1979. There was a scattering of statistics on intimate partner violence. An
analysis of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Uniform Crime Reports could be
used to determine how many homicides involved a family member as a perpetra-
tor against another family member. The Justice Department’s National Crime
Victimization Survey, however, would not include specific questions on intimate
partner violence until 1992 (Gelles, 2000).
In the absence of official statistics or high-​quality epidemiological research,
advocates stitched together anecdotes, case studies, and small-​scale surveys to
make the case that intimate violence was a significant social problem. Some of
the estimates were little more that pulling a number from thin air. Others were
extrapolations from limited studies. Whatever the source, the advocates’ statis-
tics took on a reality and a life that endured for decades. Some of the statistical
claims have faded, while others have enjoyed a long life on the web and social
media. A few of the enduring advocacy statistics and claims include:

• More women are treated in emergency rooms for battering injuries than
for muggings, rapes, and traffic accidents combined.
• The March of Dimes reports that battering during pregnancy is the lead-
ing cause of birth defects and infant mortality.
• According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), a women is bat-
tered every 15 seconds.

Each of these claims appeared on a web page in 2015, and each is incorrect to one
degree or another. The first claim, about emergency rooms, is based on a small
local study in New Haven, Connecticut, and has never been replicated on a larger
level. The March of Dimes statement is simply made up. The claim about batter-
ing every 15 seconds was never based on FBI data, but was derived from the First
National Family Violence Survey (Straus, Gelles, & Steinmetz, 1980).
The rise in concern about the problem of sexual assault on campus revived the
statistic that one in five college women is a victim of sexual assault. President
Obama embraced this statistic when he announced the creation of a White
House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault. The “one in five”
statistic is derived from the “Campus Sexual Assault Study” commissioned by
the National Institute of Justice and carried out between 2005 and 2007 (Krebs
et al., 2007). The survey was carried out at two large four-​year universities—​
clearly not a representative sample—​ a nd had a large non-​ response rate.
A second problem with the Campus Sexual Assault Study, and its predecessor
carried out by Ms. Magazine and psychologist Mary Koss and her colleagues
(1987), is concerns about the overly broad definition of what constitutes “sexual
7

Introduction      7
assault” and “rape.” The Koss survey concluded that one in four campus women
were victims of “sexual assault” (Koss, Gidycz, & Wisniewski, 1987).
The American Association of Universities (AAU) commissioned their own
survey of sexual assault on member campuses.2 The AAU Campus Climate Survey
on Sexual Assault and Sexual Misconduct contacted students on 27 campuses (16
AAU members). Representative samples of students were contacted by email on
each campus. The survey headline echoed previous campus sexual assault surveys:

“More Than 1 in 5 Female Undergrads at Top Schools Suffer Sexual Attacks.”3

But the AAU survey suffered from the same methodological problems as prior
studies. First, the overall response rate across the 27 universities was only 19.3%.
Second, the top-​line headline of “1 in 5 Female Undergrads” combined all forms
of sexual assault and exploitation, ranging from forced penetration to unwanted
kissing.
Are we being overly picky when we point out the methodological weaknesses
and flaws in advocates’ and advocacy groups’ statistics? After all, isn’t one victim
enough? Well, first and foremost, the reality is that “one victim is not enough.”
Many illnesses and social problems bid for public attention, resources, and policy
solutions. It really is important to know how many individuals and families are
victimized and what is the nature of the harm caused by the problem. Second,
bad data can produce harmful reactions, policies, and programs. Many parents
react emotionally when they hear about advocacy statistics claiming that hun-
dreds of thousands of children are abducted by strangers. Parents line up to have
their children fingerprinted and impress upon their children the need to be wary
of any stranger. In reality, nearly all of the hundreds of thousands of missing
children are involved in parental or relative kidnapping. The number of children
kidnapped and actually killed by strangers is less than 100 per year (Gelles, 2011).
Why terrify children about a problem they are less likely to experience than
almost any other physical threat?

Controversies

Myths and advocacy statistics can mostly be managed by sound research and ap-
propriate methodological critiques. Controversies, on the other hand, arise from
deep-​seated beliefs and values about the way the world should be and are not so
easily dismissed or countered. This section examines some of the major contro-
versies that continue to influence the ways in which we understand and respond
to the problems of intimate violence and abuse.
8

8      Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

Is it a psychological or a social problem? At first glance, it is easy to understand
why many people assume that abusers are mentally ill and suffer from some
kind of psychopathy. Given the media, newspaper accounts, photos, and now
Internet videos of cases of abuse, the nearly obvious takeaway is that no one
who is mentally stable would do such a thing. The earliest writings on child
maltreatment and wife abuse all came to the same conclusion—​mental illness
is the cause of intimate and family violence. But all the early studies were case
studies of a very small number of victims or offenders who were seen by mental
health or medical professionals. And all the diagnoses were carried out after
the offense occurred. Larger, more representative studies undermined the case
that mental illness or psychopathy is the sole cause of abusive acts. Researchers
identify social factors that are correlated with child maltreatment and intimate
partner violence. Both surveys and case study data indicated that intimate vio-
lence rates are higher in low-​income families and among individuals who were
unemployed or underemployed. Social stressors and social isolation also are
correlated with high rates of abuse. Some forms of intimate victimization, how-
ever, such as sexual abuse of children, are not correlated with social factors
at all. Later chapters in this book will delve deeper into the psychological and
social factors that increase the risk of intimate violence and abuse. For this dis-
cussion, we can conclude with some general findings. Child maltreatment, inti-
mate partner abuse, and other forms of intimate violence can be found among
all social and demographic groups. But the distribution is not even. The risk of
intimate violence is greater in some social groups and lower in others—​even
when factoring in that some social characteristics increase the risk of being
reported for or identified for engaging in some form of intimate violence. Yet,
in some cases, psychological factors are the most salient explanatory variables.
While reducing poverty would certainly lower the overall rate of child abuse
and neglect, some abuse and neglect is going to occur independently of the eco-
nomic resources available to caregivers.
It is the drink and the drugs. The second most common explanation for intimate
violence and abuse is that it is the result of “demon rum” and “damned drugs.”
The common-​sense link between alcohol, drugs, and violence is not without sup-
port. Research indicates that as many as half the instances of violence and abuse
in families involve some alcohol or drugs (Flanzer, 2005). This is a very strong as-
sociation. But do drugs and/​or alcohol cause people to become violent? Are drugs
and alcohol dis-​inhibitors that unleash violent behavior? And would solving the
drug or drinking problem eliminate the violence? Common sense frequently says
“yes” to these questions. Empirically sound research, however, generally argues
“no” (Gelles & Cavanaugh, 2005).
9

Introduction      9

Global Perspectives box 1.1

Alcohol and Violence: Cultur al Expectations and Time-​O ut

“Only when he was drinking would he do that. When he was sober, he was a totally
different man.”
One of the most consistent findings from studies of intimate violence and abuse
is the link between alcohol and violence. Time and again, victims and observers
would point out that perpetrators would only be violent when under the influence
of alcohol. Alcohol, it seems, is some kind of superego solvent that dissolves inhibi-
tions and releases violent and other suppressed behaviors.
Anthropologists Craig MacAndrew and Robert Edgerton (1969) explode the
myth of alcohol as a superego solvent in their cross-​cultural examination of al-
cohol and behavior. How people behave when drunk, MacAndrew and Edgerton
point out, is very much dependent on the local culture’s view of alcohol and accept-
able behavior. Among the Camba, a population of some 80,000 in eastern Bolivia,
alcohol beverages are consumed regularly and in large quantities. Yet, when drink-
ing, the Camba rarely express physical or verbal aggression. An early twentieth-​
century ethnography of the Papago, who lived in what is now southern Arizona,
describe instances when Papago men consumed so much alcohol that they were
literally falling down drunk; yet, there was little quarreling and few fights.
The bottom line of MacAndrew and Edgerton’s analysis is that cultural expecta-
tions, rather than the chemical properties of alcohol, greatly influence how people
behave when they drink or drink heavily.
So why is there a link between drinking and violence in the United States and
so many other countries and cultures? MacAndrew and Edgerton (1969, p. 90) ex-
plain that in those countries where drinking leads to what appears to be “out-​of-​
character” behavior, cultural norms create a “time-​out” from everyday rules and
norms. Knowing they will not be held accountable for their behavior when drink-
ing is much more of a superego solvent than the actual alcohol.

Source: MacAndrew, C., & Edgerton, R. B. (1969). Drunken Comportment: A Social Explanation.
Chicago: Aldine.

There is little scientific evidence to support the theory that alcohol and drugs,
such as cocaine, have chemical and pharmacological properties that directly pro-
duce violent and abusive behavior. Evidence from cross-​cultural research, labora-
tory studies, blood tests of men arrested for partner abuse, and survey research
all indicate that, although alcohol use may be associated with intimate violence,
alcohol is not a primary cause of the intimate partner violence (Caetano, Schafer, &
Cunradi, 2001; O’Farrell, Van Hutton, & Murphy, 1999; MacAndrew & Edgerton,
1969). It is probable that some individuals may even consciously use alcohol and/​
or drugs as an excuse for their violent behavior.
10

10      Intimate Violence and Abuse in Families

In some cultures, people drink and become violent; in others, people drink and
are passive (See Global Perspectives Box 1.1). What explains the difference? The
difference is due to what people in those societies believe about alcohol. If they
believe alcohol or drugs are disinhibitors, people become disinhibited. If they
believe that alcohol is a depressant, people become depressed. Because our soci-
ety believes that alcohol and drugs release violent tendencies, people are given a
“time-​out” from the acceptable rules of social behavior when they drink or when
people believe they are drunk. Combine the time-​out with the desire to cover up
instances of family violence, and one has the perfect excuse: “I didn’t know what
I was doing: I was drunk.” Or, from the victim’s perspective, “My partner is a
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—​when he drinks, he is violent; when he is sober, there
is no problem.” In the end, violent partners and parents learn that if they do not
want to be held responsible for their violence, they should either drink before
they hit, or at least say they were drunk.
One drug does stand out, however, as a possible cause of violent behavior—​
amphetamine. Amphetamine use is associated with increased crime and violence.
In fact, if used frequently, it is more closely related to violent behavior than any
other psychoactive drugs. Amphetamines raise excitability and muscle tension,
and this may lead to impulsive behavior. The behavior that follows from amphet-
amine use is related to both the dosage and the pre-​use personality of the user.
Frequent users who already have aggressive personalities are likely to become
more aggressive when using this drug (Kosten & Singha, 1999).
Except for the evidence that appears to link amphetamine use to violence, the
picture of the alcohol-​and drug-​crazed partner or parent who impulsively and
violently abuses a family member is a distortion. If alcohol and other drugs are
linked to violence at all, it is through a complicated set of individual, situational,
and social factors (Gelles & Cavanaugh, 2005).
Only men are violent; if women strike their partners, it is only in self-​defense. It
would be fair to say that the most enduring and heated controversy in the study
of intimate partner violence is the question of female-​to-​male violence. More
than 40 years ago, when I published my first book on domestic violence and initi-
ated the scholarly conversation about intimate partner violence (Gelles, 1974),
the initial reaction to my data on female-​to-​male violence was that such violence
simply does not occur (Dobash & Dobash, 1979). A few years later, when Suzanne
Steinmetz published her journal article “The Battered Husband Syndrome” (1977),
she was severely criticized for making up an issue based on case studies and
cartoon representations of female-​to-​male violence (Pleck, Pleck, Grossman, &
Bart, 1977). Shortly thereafter, Murray Straus and his colleagues (Straus, 1977;
Straus, Gelles, & Steinmetz, 1980) published the results of the First National
11

Introduction      11
Family Violence Survey. The survey, based on in-​person interviews with a nation-
ally representative sample of 2,147 households, found that the rates of female-​
to-​male violence—​both minor and severe violence—​were equivalent to the rates
of male-​to-​female violence. To say this finding set off a firestorm of protest in
the academic and advocacy arenas would be an understatement. Straus and his
colleagues actually received death threats. Straus himself was accused of using
his research to cover up his own wife battering. When the ad hominem attacks
quieted down, critics focused on the methodology—​specifically the way intimate
partner violence was measured using the Conflict Tactics Scales (Loseke & Kurz,
2005). Straus consistently rebutted each of the methodological critiques (Straus,
2005, 2011; Straus & Ramirez, 2007). Chapters 4 and 5 of this book look more
deeply into the various statistics and studies of intimate partner violence and
what has come to be known as the “gender symmetry” controversy. Suffice it to
say, the controversy burns as brightly today as it did in 1977.
Violence always gets worse. A less volatile, but persistent, belief among those
who work with victims of violence and abuse is that, left unchecked, violence will
always escalate. In fact, some researchers suggest that minor assaults of any type
are likely to lead to more serious attacks (Feld & Straus, 1989; Pagelow, 1981).
But Feld and Straus (1989) also found that couples reported that from one year
to the next, 33% of couples said that there was no violence in the year following a
year in which violence occurred. This provides evidence of desistence. Secondly,
research finds that, instead of violence escalating, there are various types of of-
fenders, and that certain types of offenders never escalate their violence above a
certain threshold. A recent review of the literature on violence typologies reveals
that male batterers can be classified into three categories—​low-​, moderate-​, and
high-​r isk offenders (Cavanaugh & Gelles, 2005). The three types of offenders can
be further subtyped according to the dimensions of severity and frequency of
violence, criminal history, and level of psychopathology (see Table 1.1).
The specific characteristics, particular to both the type of offender and the
individual within that type, create a threshold at which the offender either will
or will not escalate in violence. This is not to say that this threshold can never be
crossed; only that it is unlikely that an offender will “move” from one particular
type to another. This observation refutes previous claims among researchers and
advocates that battering always escalates in frequency and intensity over time.
Is the answer compassion or control? Forty years ago, the prevailing response to
intimate partner violence was indifference, unless a severe injury occurred. The
police in Washington, D.C., applied an informal “stitch rule” that meant that,
unless an injury required a specific number of surgical sutures, the perpetra-
tor would not be arrested (Gelles, 1974). In response to this and other similarly
days the tries

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