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Gender Differences in Risk Markers for Perpetration of Physical Partner Violence: Results from a Meta-Analytic Review

DOI:10.1007/s10896-016-9860-9
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Chelsea Spencer at Kansas State University
Chelsea Spencer
Bryan Cafferky
Bryan Cafferky
Bryan Cafferky
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Sandra M Stith at Kansas State University
Sandra M Stith
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Abstract

There is a lack of consensus on whether the use of intimate partner violence (IPV) is distinctly different between men and women, or if men and women share similar risk markers for perpetrating IPV. In this study, we compared 60 different risk markers for IPV perpetration for men and women using a meta-analysis. We found three out of 60 risk markers significantly differed between men and women. Our results suggest that there are more similarities between men and women than there are differences in risk markers for IPV perpetration.
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Gender Differences in Risk Markers for Perpetration of Physical
Partner Violence: Results from a Meta-Analytic Review
Chelsea Spencer
1
&Bryan Cafferky
2
&Sandra M. Stith
3
Published online: 2 September 2016
#Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016
Abstract There is a lack of consensus on whether the use of
intimate partner violence (IPV) is distinctly different between
men and women, or if men and women share similar risk
markers for perpetrating IPV. In this study, we compared 60
different risk markers for IPV perpetration for men and women
usingameta-analysis.Wefoundthreeoutof60riskmarkers
significantly differed between men and women. Our results sug-
gest that there are more similarities between men and women
than there are differences in risk markers for IPV perpetration.
Keywords Intimate partner violence perpetration .IPV .
Gender .Meta-analysis
Some researchers examining factors related to why individ-
uals perpetrate violence against their intimate partners have
taken a gendered approach, looking at men’s and women’s
use of intimate partner violence (IPV) as distinctly different
(Langhinrichsen-Rohling et al. 2012). However, other re-
searchers have viewed men’s and women’s perpetration of
IPVas stemming from a variety of risk markers that are similar
for men and women (Straus 2011). There is currently no clear
consensus in the literature about whether risk markers related
to men’s and women’s use of violence in intimate relation-
ships are distinctly different from one another, or if men and
women share the same risk markers for perpetrating IPV. This
paper presents an overview of findings from a meta-analytic
review to address this controversy.
A number of individual studies have addressed this contro-
versy. For example, Swan et al. (2008) non-systematic litera-
ture review highlighted research that supports the notion that
men are more likely than women to use violence as a means to
control their partners or exert dominance over their partners.
This perception of partner violence as a gendered phenome-
non looks at IPVas a result of the inequality within romantic
relationships which supports male dominance and fosters
male power and control (Yllo 2005). This perception suggests
that men’s perpetration of IPV is a strategy to dominate and
control their partners. Researchers who focus on IPV as a
gendered phenomenon would expect that risk markers for
male versus female IPV would differ and that, for example,
control would be a stronger risk marker for men’sperpetration
of IPV than for women’sperpetration.
However, other researchers have found that women are just
as likely as are men to use violence as a means to control or
dominate their partners (Straus 2005). For example, Graham-
Kevan and Archer’s(2005) cross-sectional study found that
controlling behaviors was a significant predictor of women
perpetrating violence against their intimate partners. These
findings suggest that control would be an equally strong risk
marker for women using violence in intimate relationships as
it would be for men.
An alternative perspective is that men’sperpetrationofIPV
is less about their desire for domination and control, and more
about their restricted range of strategies for conflict resolution
(Straus 2005). This suggests that men perpetrate IPV because
they have maladaptively chosen to use violence as a result of
their inability to resolve conflict in their intimate relationships.
*Chelsea Spencer
cspencer@ksu.edu
1
Kansas State University, 2801 Goodrich Circle,
Manhattan, KS 66502, USA
2
Loma Linda University, Griggs Hall, Office 203, 11065 Campus
Street, Loma Linda, CA 92350, USA
3
Kansas State University, 101 Campus Creek Complex, 1405 Campus
Creek Road, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA
J Fam Viol (2016) 31:981–984
DOI 10.1007/s10896-016-9860-9
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.
... Die empirische Forschung hat eine Anzahl von Risikofaktoren für die Ausübung 2 von IPG identifiziert. Grundsätzlich muss von einem komplexen Zusammenspiel verschiedener Risikofaktoren ausgegangen werden (beispielsweise Stith et al. 2004;Spencer et al. 2016 Hilton et al. (2014) in einer längsschnittlichen Studie über 9 Jahre (n = 30) eine hohe prädiktive Validität (AUC = 0,72) des ODARA (wobei die Rückfallraten von denen der Männer abwichen). Dies ist zurzeit als vorläufiges Resultat einzustufen (Yaxley et al. 2018), das in Deutschland bzw. ...
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