A Typology of Domestic Violence

by Johnson, Michael P.

• ISBN13: 9781555536947
• ISBN10: 1555536948
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-06-30
• Publisher: UNIVERSITY PRESS OF NEW ENGLAND

Summary

Domestic violence, a serious and far-reaching social problem, has generated two key debates among researchers. The first debate is about gender and domestic violence. Some scholars argue that domestic violence is primarily male-perpetrated, others that women are as violent as men in intimate relationships. Johnson's response to this debate--and the central theme of this book--is that there is more than one type of intimate partner violence. Some studies address the type of violence that is perpetrated primarily by men, while others are getting at the kind of violence that women areinvolved in as well. Because there has been no theoretical framework delineating types of domestic violence, researchers have easily misread one another's studies. The second major debate involves how many women are abused each year by their partners. Estimates range from two to six million. Johnson's response once again comes from this book's central theme. If there is more than one type of intimate partner violence, then the numbers depend on what type you're talking about. Johnson argues that domestic violence is not a unitary phenomenon. Instead, he delineates three major, dramatically different, forms of partner violence: intimate terrorism, violent resistance, and situational couple violence. He roots the conceptual distinctions among the forms of violence in an analysis of the role of power and control in relationship violence and shows that the failure to make these basic distinctions among types of partner violence has produced a research literature that is plagued by both overgeneralizations and ostensibly contradictory findings. This volume begins the work of theorizing forms of domestic violence, a crucial first step to a better understanding of these phenomena among scholars, social scientists, policy makers, and service providers.

Author Biography

MICHAEL P. JOHNSON is Associate Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Women's Studies, and African and African American Studies at Pennsylvania State University.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
Control and Violence in Intimate Relationships	p. 5
Intimate Terrorism and Other Types of Partner Violence	p. 7
Intimate Terrorism	p. 7
Violent Resistance	p. 10
Situational Couple Violence	p. 11
Mutual Violent Control	p. 12
Doing Research on Intimate Terrorism and Other Types of Partner Violence	p. 12
Asking the Right Questions: The Nature of Coercive Control	p. 13
Not Asking the Right Questions: The Battered Husband Fiasco	p. 17
When the Right Questions Aren't Asked, Where Do We Find the Types?	p. 23
Intimate Terrorism: Controlling Your Partner	p. 25
The Basic Characteristics of (Heterosexual Men's) Intimate Terrorism	p. 26
Nonviolent Control Tactics	p. 26
The Nature and Pattern of the Violence	p. 29
Who Are the Intimate Terrorists?	p. 30
Two Types of Intimate Terrorists: Psychological Commonalities and Differences	p. 31
Risk Markers for Intimate Terrorism	p. 33
The Effects of Intimate Terrorism	p. 37
Economic Effects	p. 38
Physical Health	p. 39
Psychological Health	p. 41
Effects on the Relationship with the Abuser	p. 43
Incipient Intimate Terrorism/Nonviolent Coercive Control	p. 46
Fighting Back: Violent Resistance	p. 48
Women Coping with Intimate Terrorism	p. 48
Violent Resistance	p. 51
Leaving	p. 53
Desperate Acts	p. 55
The Good News	p. 59
Conflicts That Turn Violent: Situational Couple Violence	p. 60
Variability in the Violence Itself	p. 61
The Causes of Chronic Situational Couple Violence	p. 62
Sources of Couple Conflict	p. 63
Couple Communication Patterns That Affect Escalation to Violence	p. 65
Individual Background and Personality Factors That Affect Escalation to Violence	p. 67
The Effects of Situational Couple Violence	p. 69
Physical Health	p. 69
Psychological Health	p. 69
The Relationship with the Abuser	p. 70
The Essential Variability of Situational Couple Violence	p. 70
Implications for Intervention, Prevention, and Research	p. 72
Implications for Intervention	p. 72
Shelters and Other Battered Women's Services	p. 73
Law Enforcement	p. 75
Batterer Programs	p. 78
Family Court and Child Protective Services	p. 81
Coordinated Community Response	p. 83
Implications for Prevention	p. 83
Implications for Research	p. 84
Identifying Intimate Terrorism and Other Types of Partner Violence	p. 87
Measuring Coercive Control	p. 87
Identifying High Coercive Control	p. 90
What Is the Role of Violence in the Typology?	p. 91
The Data in this Book	p. 91
Samples and Measures Used in the Analyses for This Book	p. 92
Johnson et al.: Six Other Papers	p. 94
Stalking and Separation-Precipitated Violence	p. 102
Intimate Terrorism and the Risks of Leaving	p. 102
Separation-Precipitated Violence That May Be Situational Couple Violence	p. 103
Gender and Intimate Partner Violence	p. 105
Gender and Intimate Terrorism	p. 105
What About Situational Couple Violence?	p. 107
A Note on Same-Sex Relationships	p. 109
Notes	p. 111
References	p. 141
Index	p. 155
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