Citation

Jankowski MK, Leitenberg H, Henning K, Coffey P. J. Fam. Violence 1999; 14(3): 267-279.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont, 05401; Department of Psychiatry, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, One Medical Center Drive, Lebanon, New Hampshire, 03756-0001; Department of Psychology, University of Memphis, Memph

Copyright

(Copyright © 1999, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1023/A:1022814416666

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The present study examined the association between witnessing interparental violence as a child, and the risk for perpetrating and being the victim of dating aggression as an adult, in an undergraduate sample. Specifically, this study tested a modeling hypothesis whereby witnessing a same sex parent vs. an opposite sex parent exclusively in the aggressor role would be more highly associated with risk for perpetrating dating aggression. Similarly, observing a same sex parent vs. an opposite sex parent as exclusively a victim of marital aggression would be associated with risk for being a victim of dating aggression. A same sex modeling effect was found for perpetration of dating aggression. Respondents who witnessed only their same sex parent perpetrate physical marital aggression were at increased risk for perpetrating physical dating aggression, whereas respondents who witnessed only their opposite sex parent perpetrate were not. A same sex modeling effect, however, was not found for being a victim of dating aggression. Rather, risk for victimization by dating aggression was associated only with witnessing bidirectional marital violence. Implications of these results, limitations of the present study, and ideas for future research are discussed.
witnessing interparental violence - dating aggression - intergenerational transmission of aggression - modeling theory.