Unique Risk and Protective Factors for Partner Aggression in a Large Survey
Unique Risk and Protective Factors for Partner Aggression in a Large Survey
The objective of this study is to examine risk factors of physical aggression against a partner in a large representative Active Duty Air Force sample. A stratified sample of 128,950 United States Active Duty members were invited to participate in an Air Force-wide anonymous online survey across 82 bases. The final sample (N = 52,780) was weighted to be representative of the United States Air Force. Backward stepwise regression analyses were conducted to identify unique predictors of partner physical aggression perpetration within and across different ecological levels (individual, family, organization, and community levels). Relationship satisfaction, alcohol problems, financial stress, and number of years in the military were identified as unique predictors of men's and women's perpetration of violence against their partner across ecological levels. Parental status, support from neighbors, personal coping, and support from formal agencies also uniquely predicted men's but not women's perpetration of violence across ecological levels. This study identified specific risk factors of partner violence that may be targeted by prevention and intervention efforts aimed at different levels of impact (e.g., family interventions, community-wide programs).
Intimate partner violence is a major public health problem, affecting millions of American families each year. Prevalence of physically aggressive acts toward partners in the United States is estimated at approximately 16%. Partner aggression is associated with major depressive episodes and posttraumatic stress disorder in women, poorer health, substance abuse, depressive symptoms, and injury among men and women. Although both women and men are injured by their aggressive partners, injury is more likely for women than men. Longitudinal studies also show that physical aggression against women and men is associated with marital discord and divorce.
Partner violence is as much of a problem in military communities as civilian ones. Each year, the United States Air Force substantiates approximately 2,900 partner maltreatment incidents. Over $30 million is spent each year on the Air Force Family Advocacy Program to prevent, assess, and treat family maltreatment and to maintain a central registry of substantiated cases. Concern about partner violence in the military led to the formation of a congressionally mandated task force on domestic violence in the Department of Defense. Not unlike in civilian communities, both perpetrators and victims are motivated to keep maltreatment incidents private. Recent data suggest that fewer than 10% of individuals involved in a severely partner abusive relationship in the Air Force have come to anyone's formal or informal attention for these problems, which makes outreach and prevention efforts targeting the continuum of aggression critical.
The risk and protective factor literature on partner aggression is extensive. Most of this work has focused on a few factors drawn from specific theoretical approaches to partner abuse. Dutton argued that we could improve our understanding of partner abuse by examining a broader range of potential causes that vary in their ecological level of origin and level of influence with an eye to understanding how these factors fit together. Levels described by Bronfenbrenner included macrosystem (societal), exosystem (contextual such as workplace stressors), microsystem (household or relationship) and ontogenetic (individual) factors. Integration of many potential causes assessed across multiple ecological levels might be a necessary step in the development of more effective approaches to preventing partner aggression. Some multivariate models have been tested that evaluated how subsets of predictor variables from specific theoretical approaches relate to one another and to partner aggression. However, this research remains relatively new and further research is necessary to elucidate how factors might operate across levels.
In this paper, we use a large, representatively sampled survey data set of active duty Air Force members to investigate a series of hypotheses about risk factors for perpetration of partner violence across the full continuum of aggression, ranging from milder acts (e.g., pushing, slapping) to more serious, potentially injurious acts (e.g., punching, kicking hard, burning). Based on the existing literature a variety of variables reflecting individual functioning (e.g., depressive symptoms, general self-efficacy), relationship/family functioning (e.g., relationship satisfaction, family coping ability), workplace functioning (e.g., workgroup cohesion), and community functioning (e.g., community safety, community cohesion) were selected for examination in this study. Because of the military nature of this sample, and the relative lack of information about military-related risk factors, a number of factors that could plausibly be related to partner abuse but that had not previously been examined in the literature, were also included (e.g., support from leaders, spouse's ability to cope with deployment) as hypothesized predictors.
We hypothesized several variables at each ecological level would be significantly related to partner aggression perpetration. Because ecological analyses have implications helping guide both for integrated theory development as well as prevention and outreach activities, which can occur at any or all of the ecological levels, after testing the specifically hypothesized bivariate relations, we then developed regression models of uniquely additive risk factors both within and across ecological levels. This allows theoreticians and program developers alike to understand, for example, all (a) all the significant community risk factors for partner aggression, (b) the unique community risk factors for partner aggression, and (c) community risk factors that account for unique variance in partner aggression when considered in the context of risk factors from all ecological levels.
Parallel analyses were conducted separately for men and women. Women's perpetration has been less well studied; however, the literature that does exist on partner aggression suggests the factors that place women at risk for acting aggressively are not noticeably different than the factors that place men at risk for such acts. Thus, we did not hypothesize gender effects but did keep the genders separate to allow different patterns to be detectable.
Abstract and Introduction
Abstract
The objective of this study is to examine risk factors of physical aggression against a partner in a large representative Active Duty Air Force sample. A stratified sample of 128,950 United States Active Duty members were invited to participate in an Air Force-wide anonymous online survey across 82 bases. The final sample (N = 52,780) was weighted to be representative of the United States Air Force. Backward stepwise regression analyses were conducted to identify unique predictors of partner physical aggression perpetration within and across different ecological levels (individual, family, organization, and community levels). Relationship satisfaction, alcohol problems, financial stress, and number of years in the military were identified as unique predictors of men's and women's perpetration of violence against their partner across ecological levels. Parental status, support from neighbors, personal coping, and support from formal agencies also uniquely predicted men's but not women's perpetration of violence across ecological levels. This study identified specific risk factors of partner violence that may be targeted by prevention and intervention efforts aimed at different levels of impact (e.g., family interventions, community-wide programs).
Introduction
Intimate partner violence is a major public health problem, affecting millions of American families each year. Prevalence of physically aggressive acts toward partners in the United States is estimated at approximately 16%. Partner aggression is associated with major depressive episodes and posttraumatic stress disorder in women, poorer health, substance abuse, depressive symptoms, and injury among men and women. Although both women and men are injured by their aggressive partners, injury is more likely for women than men. Longitudinal studies also show that physical aggression against women and men is associated with marital discord and divorce.
Partner violence is as much of a problem in military communities as civilian ones. Each year, the United States Air Force substantiates approximately 2,900 partner maltreatment incidents. Over $30 million is spent each year on the Air Force Family Advocacy Program to prevent, assess, and treat family maltreatment and to maintain a central registry of substantiated cases. Concern about partner violence in the military led to the formation of a congressionally mandated task force on domestic violence in the Department of Defense. Not unlike in civilian communities, both perpetrators and victims are motivated to keep maltreatment incidents private. Recent data suggest that fewer than 10% of individuals involved in a severely partner abusive relationship in the Air Force have come to anyone's formal or informal attention for these problems, which makes outreach and prevention efforts targeting the continuum of aggression critical.
The risk and protective factor literature on partner aggression is extensive. Most of this work has focused on a few factors drawn from specific theoretical approaches to partner abuse. Dutton argued that we could improve our understanding of partner abuse by examining a broader range of potential causes that vary in their ecological level of origin and level of influence with an eye to understanding how these factors fit together. Levels described by Bronfenbrenner included macrosystem (societal), exosystem (contextual such as workplace stressors), microsystem (household or relationship) and ontogenetic (individual) factors. Integration of many potential causes assessed across multiple ecological levels might be a necessary step in the development of more effective approaches to preventing partner aggression. Some multivariate models have been tested that evaluated how subsets of predictor variables from specific theoretical approaches relate to one another and to partner aggression. However, this research remains relatively new and further research is necessary to elucidate how factors might operate across levels.
In this paper, we use a large, representatively sampled survey data set of active duty Air Force members to investigate a series of hypotheses about risk factors for perpetration of partner violence across the full continuum of aggression, ranging from milder acts (e.g., pushing, slapping) to more serious, potentially injurious acts (e.g., punching, kicking hard, burning). Based on the existing literature a variety of variables reflecting individual functioning (e.g., depressive symptoms, general self-efficacy), relationship/family functioning (e.g., relationship satisfaction, family coping ability), workplace functioning (e.g., workgroup cohesion), and community functioning (e.g., community safety, community cohesion) were selected for examination in this study. Because of the military nature of this sample, and the relative lack of information about military-related risk factors, a number of factors that could plausibly be related to partner abuse but that had not previously been examined in the literature, were also included (e.g., support from leaders, spouse's ability to cope with deployment) as hypothesized predictors.
We hypothesized several variables at each ecological level would be significantly related to partner aggression perpetration. Because ecological analyses have implications helping guide both for integrated theory development as well as prevention and outreach activities, which can occur at any or all of the ecological levels, after testing the specifically hypothesized bivariate relations, we then developed regression models of uniquely additive risk factors both within and across ecological levels. This allows theoreticians and program developers alike to understand, for example, all (a) all the significant community risk factors for partner aggression, (b) the unique community risk factors for partner aggression, and (c) community risk factors that account for unique variance in partner aggression when considered in the context of risk factors from all ecological levels.
Parallel analyses were conducted separately for men and women. Women's perpetration has been less well studied; however, the literature that does exist on partner aggression suggests the factors that place women at risk for acting aggressively are not noticeably different than the factors that place men at risk for such acts. Thus, we did not hypothesize gender effects but did keep the genders separate to allow different patterns to be detectable.
