The Prevalence of Domestic Violence

WHO IS ABUSED?

In the past domestic violence was viewed as a phenomenon exclusively affecting the lower classes. However, when researchers began investigating the causes of family violence in the 1970s, they noticed that although lower-class women at first appeared to make up most victims, domestic violence, in reality, spanned all social and economic groups.

Middle- and upper-class women were also abused, the researchers found, but they often did not turn to hospital emergency rooms and shelters for help. Instead, they used private facilities and remained largely unknown, unreported, and uncounted by the public agencies that attempt to measure the rates of domestic violence and aid victims.

While women of any social class may be victims of abuse, general population studies find that women with lower incomes and less education, as well as minority women, are more likely to be the primary victims of domestic violence. Still, researchers note, classification is not exclusive. Just about anyone, rich or poor, male or female, may be a victim of domestic violence.

WHO ARE THE ABUSERS?

Like victims of domestic abuse, batterers come from all socioeconomic groups and all ethnic backgrounds. They may be male or female, young or old, but by definition they share one common characteristic: they all have a personal relationship with their victims.

During 2004 men were equally likely to be victimized by a stranger (50.2%) or nonstranger (48.1%), whereas women were more likely to be victimized by someone they knew (64.1%) as opposed to a stranger (34.3%). Nearly two-thirds of rape and sexual assault victims knew their assailant (65.1%). (See Table 6.1.) Rates of violent victimization by an intimate partner toward women increase as household incomes go down, according to Callie Marie Rennison and Sarah Welchans in Intimate Partner Violence (July 2000, http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/ipv.pdf).

Single people were victimized by violent crime much more often than married or widowed people in 2004. Never-married people experienced violent crime at a rate of 39.4 per one thousand people, and divorced or separated people experienced violent crime at a rate of thirty-three per one thousand people. These rates were more than three times higher than the rates of violent crime experienced by married and widowed people. Married people experienced violent crime at a rate of 9.7 per one thousand people, whereas widowed people (who tend to be older, on average) experienced violent crime at a rate of four per one thousand people. (See Table 6.2.)

Women as Abusers

As Amy Holtzworth-Munroe points out in "Female Perpetration of Physical Aggression against an Intimate Partner: A Controversial New Topic of Study" (Violence and Victims, April 2005), until the early twenty-first century, "it was politically incorrect to even consider studying female aggression when conducting research on marital violence." However, as surveys reveal, a substantial minority of perpetrators of intimate partner violence are women. Intimate partner violence has traditionally been understood as a method to gain power and control in a relationship. Research indicates, however, that that model may be useful mainly for understanding male batterers. By contrast, Poco Kernsmith notes in "Exerting Power or Striking Back: A Gendered Comparison of Motivations for Domestic Violence Perpetration" (Violence and Victims, April 2005) that female batterers "appear more motivated by the desire to maintain personal liberties in a relationship where they have been victimized."

Motivation for battering is important to consider; so, too, is the impact and pattern of abuse. L. Kevin Hamberger addresses these issues in "Men's and Women's Use of Intimate Partner Violence in Clinical Samples: Toward a Gender-Sensitive Analysis" (Violence and Victims, April 2005). While some surveys find that women initiate domestic violence nearly as often as men, Ham-berger argues that in evaluating those results, research must also assess the impact and context of intimate partner violence. In his review, he used a model that included gender differences in key elements of partner violence, including the initiation of the pattern of violence in the relationship, how often each partner initiates violence, the physical and mental health impacts of domestic violence, behavioral and emotional responses to being victimized by violence, and the motivations of the batterer. He concludes that, even in relationships in which women also use violence against their partners, "women are disproportionately victimized by partner violence compared to men."

ESTIMATES OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Because domestic violence is often unreported, it is impossible to be certain exactly how many domestic assaults occur each year. Variations in definitions of violence and abuse, the types of questions posed by researchers, and the context in which they are asked compound the difficulty. For example, when victims are questioned in the presence of their abusers, or even other family members, they are often more reluctant to report instances of violence. Studies on the subject are sometimes contradictory, but most show that domestic violence remains a growing concern. Many researchers fear that available data represent only the tip of the iceberg of a problem of glacial proportions.

To understand why there are so many varying estimates of domestic violence, it is necessary to consider the surveys, studies, and reports themselves. Richard J. Gelles notes in "Estimating the Incidence and Prevalence of Violence against Women" (Violence against Women, July 2000) that the source and purpose of the research, the definition of abuse used, the population surveyed, and the survey setting, as well as the political agendas of the surveyors and researchers, may elicit different data and varying interpretations of these data.

According to World Report on Violence and Health (2002, http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/violence/world_report/en/full_en.pdf), Etienne G. Krug et al. find that in countries where large-scale studies are conducted, between 10% and 69% of women report they have suffered physical abuse at the hands of an intimate partner (intimates include spouses, former spouses, boyfriends, and girlfriends). One-third to one-half of these women have also been sexually assaulted by their partners. Krug et al. also observe that prostitution and trafficking for sex, activities strongly linked to violence against women and girls, appeared to be on the rise during the late 1990s and early twenty-first century.

The 1975 National Family Violence Survey and the 1985 National Family Violence Resurvey are among the most analyzed and cited data in the literature about intimate partner violence. The strength of these surveys lies in their ability to measure violent behavior that respondents might not classify as criminal. Using data from both surveys, Murray A. Straus and Richard J. Gelles estimate in "Societal Change and Change in Family Violence from 1975 to 1985 as Revealed by Two National Surveys" (Journal of Marriage and the Family, August 1986) that about 1.6 million women were severely beaten by their partners in 1985, down from 2.1 million in 1975.

The National Crime Victimization Surveys (NCVS; published by the Bureau of Justice Statistics) and the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR; published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation) are valuable sources of information on crime, including violent crime by intimate partners such as rape and sexual assault. Both studies measure the amount and prevalence of crime in the United States. The NCVS is a national survey that asks Americans about crimes they have personally suffered, including those that were not reported to the police. By its nature it cannot include coverage of murder. The UCR is a compilation of crime statistics reported by law enforcement agencies across the United States. Crimes that were not reported to the police are not included. Since they are based on different sources of data, the surveys give different results, and neither can be assumed to measure the true amount of intimate partner violence since some people will not report that it is occurring. One advantage of these surveys, however, is that they enable researchers to observe trends in interpersonal violence over time. For example, NCVS data show that the rate of nonfatal intimate violence against females declined by nearly half between 1993 and 2001 before leveling off.

A joint effort of the National Institute of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Violence against Women Survey (NVAWS) collected data about intimate and nonintimate partner violence during the 1990s. The NVAWS and NCVS are considered the most reliable sources of data about intimate partner violence, even though their differing approaches make data comparisons difficult. For example, the NCVS is a survey about crime, and because some victims do not consider instances of intimate partner violence as a crime, they are less likely to disclose them in the NCVS.

The NCVS defines an intimate partner as a spouse, former spouse, or a current or former boyfriend or girlfriend, either of the same sex or the opposite sex. (See Table 6.3.) In Criminal Victimization in the United States, 2004 (2006), the NCVS finds that in 2004, 11.2% of all violent crimes, including rape, sexual assault, aggravated assault (assault with a weapon), and simple assault victimizations (assault without a weapon and resulting in minor injuries), were committed against intimate partners. However, women were disproportionately likely to be victimized by their intimate partners. More than one out of five (20.8%) violent crimes against women were committed by intimate partners, whereas only 3.8% of violent crimes against men were committed by intimates. (See Table 6.1.)

Far more women than men are murdered by their intimate partners, as well. Crime in the United States, 2004, an annual survey, finds that in 2004, 12.8% of murders were committed by family members. In that year, 579 wives were killed by their husbands; 149 husbands were killed by their wives. In addition, 445 girlfriends were killed by their boyfriends; 147 boyfriends were killed by their girlfriends. (See Figure 6.1.)

National Violence against Women Survey

The NVAWS collected information from interviews with eight thousand men and eight thousand women to assess their experiences as victims of various types of violence, including domestic violence. The NVAWS asked survey respondents about physical assaults and rape, but excluded other sexual assaults, murders, and robberies.

In Extent, Nature, and Consequences of Intimate Partner Violence: Findings from the National Violence against Women Survey (July 2000, http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/181867.pdf), Patricia Tjaden and Nancy Thoennes find that intimate violence is pervasive in American society, with women suffering about three times as much of this violence as men. They estimate that in 1998, 22.1% of women (22.3 million) have been physically assaulted by a loved one during the course of their lifetime, whereas 7.4% of men (6.9 million) have been physically assaulted by intimates over their lifetime. (See Table 6.4.) Women were also more likely to become victims of rape, stalking, and physical assault by intimates than their male counterparts at some time during their lifetime. Furthermore, women physically assaulted by their partners averaged 6.9 assaults by the same person, as opposed to men, who averaged 4.4 assaults.

During the twelve months that preceded the interview, women also reported higher rates of rape, stalking, and physical assault than did men. Tjaden and Thoennes estimate based on NVAWS data that about 1.5% of the surveyed women (1.5 million) and 0.9% of the men (834,732) reported they had been raped and/or physically assaulted by a partner in the twelve months preceding the survey. In other words, approximately 4.8 million women and 2.9 million men are assaulted by a partner every year.

The rates of violence between intimate partners varied by race. Asian and Pacific Islanders reported lower rates of violence than men and women from other minority groups, and African-Americans and Native American and Alaskan Natives reported higher rates. (See Table 6.5.)

Tjaden and Thoennes conclude that most partner abuse and violence is not reported to the police. Women reported about one-fifth of rapes, one-quarter of physical assaults, and one-half of stalking incidents to police, whereas men who had been victimized reported abuse to police even less frequently. Table 6.6 shows the reasons victims did not report their abuse to the police. Many victims said they felt the police would not or could not do anything on their behalf. These expressions of helplessness and hopelessness—feeling that others in a position to assist would be unwilling or unable to do so—is a common characteristic shared by many victims of intimate partner violence.

STATISTICS FOR VIOLENCE IN SAME-SEX COUPLES ARE PROBLEMATIC

Tjaden and Thoennes also find that same-sex couples who lived together reported experiencing far more intimate violence in their lifetime than

heterosexual cohabitants. Among women, 39.2% of the same-sex cohabitants and 21.7% of the opposite-sex cohabitants reported being raped, physically assaulted, or stalked by a partner during their lifetime. Among men, the comparative figures were 23.1% and 7.4%, respectively.

Although survey findings indicated that members of same-sex couples have experienced more intimate partner violence than have members of heterosexual couples, the reported violence does not necessarily occur within the same-sex relationship. When comparing intimate partner victimization rates among same-sex and opposite-sex cohabitants by the gender of the perpetrator, Tjaden and Thoennes find that in 1996, 30.4% of the same-sex women cohabitants reported being victimized by a male partner sometime in their lifetime, whereas 11.4% reported being victimized by a female partner. Tjaden and Thoennes conclude that same-sex cohabiting women were three times more likely to report being victimized by a male partner than by a female partner. In comparison, women who lived with men were nearly twice as likely to report being victimized by a male than same-sex cohabiting women were to report being victimized by a female partner. (See Figure 6.2.)

According to Tjaden and Thoennes, male same-sex partners reported more partner violence than men who lived with women. About 23% of men who lived with men said they had been raped, sexually assaulted, or stalked by a male cohabitant, as opposed to just 7.4% of men who reported comparable experiences with female cohabitants. This finding confirms the widely held observation that violence and abuse in intimate partner relationships is primarily inflicted by men, whether the victimized partner is male or female.

In comparison with the research on intimate partner violence between men and women, the literature about same-sex violence is sparse, in part because many respondents may consider disclosing same-sex relationships risky and revealing partner violence within them even more sensitive. Furthermore, not all people who engage in same-sex relationships identify themselves as homosexual, leading to more questions about the quality of data gathered. The research that examines same-sex partner violence reveals that it is quite similar to heterosexual partner violence—abuse arises in the attempts of one partner to exert control over the other and it escalates throughout the course of the relationship.

National Crime Victimization Surveys

The NCVS are ongoing federal surveys that interview eighty thousand people from a representative sample of households biannually to estimate the amount of crime committed against people over age twelve in the United States. While the surveys cover all types of crime, they were extensively redesigned in 1992 to produce more accurate reports of rape, sexual assault, and other violent crimes committed by intimates or family members.

In National Crime Victimization Survey: Criminal Victimization, 2004 (September 2005, http://www.rainn.org/docs/statistics/ncvs2004.pdf), Shannan M. Catalano finds that the rate of violent crime was 21.1 per one thousand population in 2004. Although the 2004 NCVS's criminal victimization estimates are the lowest since the NCVS began in 1973, the numbers are still staggering: 5.1 million violent crimes were committed in 2004 (rape/sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault). Over half a million (578,350) violent crimes were committed against intimate partners. (See Table 6.7.)

More than one out of ten people (11.2%) who were victims of violent crimes in 2004 were victimized by intimate partners. (See Table 6.1.) Women were victimized by intimate partners at a greater rate than were men—20.8% of female victims named an intimate partner as the offender, compared with only 3.8% of men. In rape and sexual assault cases, 17.4% of women reported that the rapist was an intimate partner, 2.7% of female rape victims reported another relative was the perpetrator, and 46.9% reported a friend or acquaintance was the perpetrator.

Women identified offenders as an intimate, friend, other relative, or acquaintance in about two-thirds of violent crimes (64.1%), whereas more than half of male victims identified the offender as a stranger (50.2%). Women were also more likely to report that their offender was another relative (8.8%) than men were (5.6%). (See Table 6.1.)

Although men continued to experience higher rates of violent victimizations than women, the rates for both genders declined from 1993 to 2004. Rates among people from most racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups also declined from 1993 to 2004. The most significant annual declines in violent crime rates were observed among males and Hispanics. (See Table 6.8.)

According to Criminal Victimization in the United States, 2004, almost half (49.9%) of all violent victimizations were reported to the police in 2004—35.8% of rape and sexual assaults, 64.2% of aggravated assaults, and 44.9% of simple assaults. (See Table 6.9.) Female victims were more likely to report violent offenses than male victims. Two-thirds of African-American women (66.9%) and Hispanic women (65.1%) and about one-half (52.1%) of white women reported the violent crimes they suffered; 45.1% of African-American men, 41.6% of Hispanic men, and 45.8% of white men reported violent crimes. However, as mentioned earlier, women are known to seriously underreport sexual assaults and rapes. (See Table 6.10.)

National Family Violence Survey

The 1985 National Family Violence Resurvey, considered by many to be the source of the most important research on family violence, was originally conducted in 1975 for the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire, Durham. In the 1985 study Murray A. Straus and Richard J. Gelles found that the rate of assaults by husbands on wives had dropped slightly during the decade, from 121 instances per one hundred thousand couples in 1975 to 113 instances per one hundred thousand couples in 1985. The rate of severe violence, such as hitting, kicking, or using a weapon, however, had declined sharply, from thirty-eight to thirty per one hundred thousand couples—a 21% drop.

The study's most controversial finding indicated that women were initiating domestic violence at a rate equal to men. The 1985 study reported that in half of the cases, the abuse was mutual. After reassessing their data in 1990 and again in 1993, Straus and Gelles concluded that although there were similar levels of abuse between men and women, men were six times more likely to inflict serious injury.

In "Changes in Spouse Assault Rates from 1975 to 1992: A Comparison of Three National Surveys in the United States" (paper presented at the Thirteenth World Congress of Sociology, Bielefeld, Germany, July 1994), Murray A. Straus and Glenda Kaufman Kantor compare the rates of abuse from the 1975 National Family Violence Survey and the 1985 National Family Violence Resurvey and a 1992 survey conducted by Kantor. When the researchers reclassified "minor assault" to include pushing, grabbing, shoving, and slapping, and "severe assault" to include behavior likely to cause serious injury, such as kicking, punching, beating, and threatening with a weapon, they found some startling results.

The rates of reclassified minor assaults, which were considered less likely to cause injuries requiring medical treatment, decreased for husbands between the 1975 and 1985 surveys, yet remained constant for wives. The researchers find the same trend held true for severe assaults by husbands versus those by wives. While the rate of severe assaults by men against their wives declined 50% in the seventeen years from 1975 to 1992, severe assaults by women remained fairly steady. Straus and Kantor conclude that the reason for the decline in severe assaults by husbands was that over time men became increasingly aware that battering was a crime and grew reluctant to admit the abuse. At the same time, women had been encouraged not to tolerate abuse and to report it, accounting for an increase in the reporting of even minor instances of abuse.

When abuse was measured based on separate reports by men and women, Straus and Kantor find that minor assaults by husbands decreased from 1975 to 1985. Based on the husbands' reports, these rates continued to decline from 1985 to 1992, but wives reported an increase over the same period. Men also reported a decrease in the rate of severe abuse between 1975 and 1985, whereas women reported no change. In contrast, between 1985 and 1992 men reported a slight increase in the rate of severe abuse, whereas women reported a sharp drop of 43%. These findings appear to contradict Straus and Kantor's hypothesis that the rate change was a result of men's reluctance to report abuse and women's greater freedom to report it.

According to women, minor abuse perpetrated by wives against their husbands declined from 1975 to 1985 but increased substantially from 1985 to 1992. Men, however, said the rate of minor abuse by their wives increased over both periods. Women also reported that the rate of severe assaults against their husbands remained steady during the first decade but increased between 1985 and 1992. Husbands reported a steady decrease in severe assaults by their wives during both periods.

DRAWING CONCLUSIONS FROM THE DATA

Straus and Kantor observe that the large decrease in severe assaults by husbands was supported by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) statistics showing an 18% drop in the number of women killed by their husbands during that period. Straus and Kantor speculate that strides made over several years, such as justice system interventions to punish abusive husbands, along with the greater availability of shelters and restraining orders, played a role in the decline of severe abuse. The lack of change in minor assaults by husbands may reflect the emphasis that has been placed on severe assaults, which could allow men to mistakenly assume that an occasional slap or shove did not constitute abusive behavior.

To explain the increase in minor assaults by women, Straus and Kantor suggest that there had been no effort to condemn assaults by wives, and with increasing gender equality, women might feel entitled to hit as often as their male partners. The decrease in severe abuse by wives as reported by their husbands, which is inconsistent with the wives' responses, might have reflected men's reluctance to admit they have been victims of abuse.

ABUSED TO DEATH

In 2004, 1,159 women and 385 men were killed by an intimate partner. (See Table 6.11.) Although these statistics sound alarming, they reflect a positive trend in domestic homicides. Since 1976, when the FBI began keeping statistics on intimate murders, the number of men and women killed by an intimate partner has dropped significantly. The number of men killed by an intimate declined from 1,347 in 1976 to 385 in 2004, a decrease of 71%, and the number of women killed was stable until 1993, when it began to decline. (See Figure 6.3.)

Although the number of white females killed by an intimate increased during the 1980s, it declined after 1987. In 1997 it reached its lowest point in two decades. This decline, however, did not hold true across all relationship categories. The intimate homicide rate for white girlfriends in 2004 was about the same as it was in 1976, and while the homicide rate for white wives and former wives had declined somewhat, it had not declined as much as that for white husbands and former husbands. The intimate homicide rates among African-Americans dropped more dramatically for all relationship categories, with the steepest decline experienced by boyfriends and the most modest decrease experienced by girlfriends. (See Figure 6.4.)

Of all intimate homicides committed during this period, guns were used in a majority of the murders, although other weapons such as knives were also used. In the period between 1990 and 2004 more than two-thirds of all victims of murder at the hands of spouses and former spouses were killed by guns. However, almost half (45%) of the boyfriends murdered by their partners and one out of five (20%) of the girlfriends murdered by their partners were killed with knives. (See Figure 6.5 and Table 6.12.)

In "How Can Practitioners Help an Abused Woman Lower Her Risk of Death?" (National Institute of Justice Journal, November 2003), Carolyn Rebecca Block investigates what factors present in abusive relationships might indicate a threat of the violence escalating to homicide. She finds that certain types of past violence directed against female intimates indicate an increased risk of homicide, especially choking. She also finds that recently abused women are more likely to be killed—half of women who were killed in 1995 and 1996 by their partners had experienced violence in the previous thirty days before the survey. Increasingly frequent violent incidents posed a higher risk of homicide.