Elsevier

Child Abuse & Neglect

Volume 38, Issue 1, January 2014, Pages 147-158
Child Abuse & Neglect

Perpetration patterns and environmental contexts of IPV in Sweden: Relationships with adult mental health

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2013.10.023Get rights and content

Abstract

Although excellent data exist on the overall prevalence of childhood exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV), there is less information available on the specific patterns of IPV exposure in childhood and how they influence adult mental health. The current study examines 703 Swedish adults who reported exposure to IPV in childhood. Participants were part of a large national study on violence exposure. They provided an extensive history of their exposure to IPV and maltreatment experiences during childhood via electronically administered questionnaires. Mean comparison and multivariate regression methods were employed to assess differences in violence severity by reported perpetration pattern (mother-only, father-only, bidirectional or other), the association between violence severity and environmental context, and the contribution of these characteristics to adult mental health outcomes. Overall, violence perpetrated in public and by fathers was more severe and was related to poorer mental health outcomes in adulthood for child witnesses. These findings provide important insight into possible clinical “flags” for identifying children at high risk for exposure to IPV and abuse in the home.

Section snippets

The current study

Based on a review of the literature, there appears to be a great need for additional in-depth analysis of perpetration patterns and environmental contexts of IPV in Sweden. This study, therefore, first aims to evaluate whether IPV severity varies by perpetration pattern and environmental context. Male perpetration of IPV has been shown to be more severe in nature than female-perpetrated violence in American samples (Capaldi et al., 2009, Weston et al., 2005), and it is postulated that a similar

Participants

Participants in the current study were drawn from a nationally representative dataset of 2500 Swedish adults, who participated in the RESUMÉ-project (Cater, Andershed, & Andershed, 2013). The main objective of the RESUMÉ-project was to study prevalence of victimization to different kinds of violence during childhood. For the RESUMÈ-project, randomly sampled adults between the ages of 20 and 24 were drawn from the national inhabitant register. Random selection was constrained to proportional

Characteristics of intimate partner violence exposure

On average, the adult respondents reported that the duration of childhood exposure to intimate partner violence was eight years (SD = 5.48). The number of violent parent-figures ranged from one to four, with an average of two (SD = 0.59). Respondents’ reports of the pervasiveness of violence across contexts ranged from one to five locations (M = 1.15, SD = 0.48). There was also a great amount of variability in the severity of IPV, with participants reporting rare violence (11; 30% participants) to very

Discussion

This study aimed to make an original contribution to the field of violence research by examining the various settings in which violence takes place, the patterns of who perpetrates IPV, and the mental health outcomes in adulthood of individuals who witnessed such violence during childhood. Further, these aims were evaluated in a nationally representative sample of Swedish young adults; thus offering distinct information about IPV exposure in a Nordic community population. By delving into the

Conclusion

In sum, the current study employed diverse statistical methods to assess differences in violence severity by reported perpetration pattern (mother-only, father-only, or bidirectional), the association between violence severity and environmental context, and the contribution of these characteristics to adult mental health outcomes in a sample of Swedish adults exposed to IPV as children. Overall, witnessed violence perpetrated in public and by fathers was more severe and was related to poorer

Acknowledgement

This study was financially supported by the National Board of Health and Welfare in Sweden, but the findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors only.

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