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E' 297 020 TM 012 009 AUTHOR Straus, Murray A. TITLE The Conflict Tactics Scales andIts Critics: An Evaluation and New Dataon Validity and Reliability. INSTITUTION New Hampshire Univ., Durham. Family ResearchLab. SPONS AGENCY Northwest Regional Educational Lab., Portland, Oreg. PUB DATE Dec 87 GRANT R01-MH40027; T32-MH15161 NOTE 53p.; For a related document,see TM 012 007. This document will appear in "Physical Violence in American Families: Risk Factors and Adaptationsto Violence in 8,145 Families" by M.A. Straus and R. J. Gelles to be published by TransactionPress in late 1988 or early 1989. PUB TYPE Reports - Research/Technical (143) Information Analyses (070)

EDRS PRICE MF01/PC03 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Child Abuse; Concurrent Validity; *Conflict; Construct Validity; Factor Structure; Family Problems; *Family Violence; Literature Reviews; *Rating Scales; Test Reliability; *TestValidity ID}NTIFIERS *Conflict Tactics Scales ABSTRACT The Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) isthe most widely used instrument for measuring the tacticsused by members of a family in a conflict situation. It is intendedto measure the extent to which family membersuse reasoning, verbal aggression, and physical aggression. Focus is on:(1) bringing together and evaluating criticisms of the CTS so thatusers can be informed of problems and limitations of the instrument; (2) describingrevisions and supplementary questions that were introduced inthe 1985 National Family Violence Resurvey to deal withsome of the criticisms; and (3) presenting new dataon the factor structure, reliability, and validity of the CTS basedon the 1985 Resurvey and on data reported by several other investigators whohave used the CTS. The most unique aspect of the CTS is the measurement of physicalviolence in the family (child and spouse abuse); theCTS has the most serious deficiencies in this area. Evidenceof a stable factor structure, moderate reliability, and concurrent validity;and strong evidence supporting construct validity suggestthat the CTS is the best available instrument for measuringintra-family violence. (TJH)

*********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRSare the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** The Conflict Tactics Scales and Its Critics: An Evaluation and New Data on Validity andReliabii.ty*

Murray A. Straus Family Research Laboratory University of New Hampshire, Durham,NH 03824

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY CENTER (ERIC) 'This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization NuPkRY4- STR/90S originating it O Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality

Points of view or Opinions Stated in this doctr ment do not necessarily represent Official OERI position or policy. TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)."

2 VB6

I 4 Preliminary Incomplete

THE CONFLICT TACTICS SCALESAND ITS CRITICS: AN EVALUATION AND NEW DATAON VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY*

Murray A. Straus Family Research Laboratory,University of New Hampshire Durham, NH 03824 (603) 862-2594

Contents

USERS AND CRITICS OF THE CONFLICT TACTICS SCALES 3 History Of the CTS 3 Objectives Of The Chapter 3 Description of the CTS 4 CRITICISMS OF THE CTS 4 Restricted To Conflict Related Violence 5 Limited Set Of Violent Acts 5 Threats Are Counted As Violence 7 Self-Reports Are Inaccurate Using A One Year Period 7 Equates Acts That Differ GreatlyIn Sariousness Context Is Ignored 8 8 Ignores Who Initiates ViolenceAnd Injuries 10 "Minor" Versus "Severe" CategoriesDistort Gender Differences . . 12 Does Not Measure Process And Sequence 13 Does Not Identify A Clinically Meaningful Population 13

THE CTS AS A MEASURE OF CHILDABUSE 14 The CTS Physical Punishment and Physical Abuse Indexes 14 Under-Utilization of The CTS In Child Abuse Research 15 Institutional Impediments 16 Shortcomings Of The CTS For Measuring Child Abuse 16

To appear in Murray A. Straus and Richard J.Gelles,Physical Violence In American Families: Risk Factors and AdaptationsTo Violence in 8,145 Families, to be published by Transaction Press inlate 1988 or early 1989. A preliminary version was presented at the 1987 meeting ofthe National Councilon Family Relations. Some of the data are fromthe National Family Violence Resurvey, funded by NationalInstitute of Mental Health grant R01MH40027. This research is part of theFamily Violence Research Program of the Family Research Laboratory,University of New Hampshire. A program description and listof publicationscan be obtained by writing to the Family Research Laboratory, Universityof New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824. The Family Violence ResearchProgram hasalso been supported by a NIMH "training grant" (T32MH15161), bythe University of New Hampshire, and in past years grants from a number of otherorganizations. It is a pleasure to acknowledge the support of these organizationsand to express appreciation to Michael Martin,David M.Klein, and Maximiliane Szinovacz for comments and suggestions which aided in the revision ofthe paper.

VB6.P,VB105,9December87, Page 1 ALTERNATIVE MEASURES OFINTRA-FAMILY VIOLENCE 17 Single Questions, ShortForms, And Modifications Child Abuse Measures 17 Spouse Abuse Measures 18 20 RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY Reliability 21 21 Factor Structure Of the CTS Concurrent Validity 22 23 Gender of Respondent andRelationships between Variables Social Desirability 26 Response Set As A Threat To Validity 26 Gender Similarity As EvidenceOf Validity For Research Purposes . Construct Validity 27 27 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 29 APPENDIX after page 31

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VB6.P,V8106,9December87, Page 2 USERS AND CRITICS OF THE CONFLICTTACTICS SCALES

History Of the CTS

The Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) is the most widely used instrument formeasuring the tactics used by members of a family in a conflict situation. It is intended to measure the extent to which family members use Reasoning, Verbal Aggression, and PhysicalAggression. i.e. Violence.

The most unique aspect of the CTS is the measurement of physicalviolence in the family. Since the use of the CTS to measure physical abuse of childrenand spouses is also the most controversial aspect of the instrument, the bulk of thischapter will be devoted to that. Moreover, since even the term violence is controversial in thesense that there is no csmsensus, scientific or public, on the definition, it is essentialto begin with the definition which underlies the CTS.

For purpose of the CTS and the research for which it was originally designed,Violence is defined as an act carried out with the intention, or perceivedintention, of causing physical pain or injury to another person.*1 Violence as just defined issynonymous with the term physical aggression as used in social psychology (Bandura, 1973;Berkowitz, 1962). In addition, with the exception of violent acts which are permitted or required bylaw (for example, physical punishment by parents is permitted and executionsare required in some circumstances), violence as just defined is synonymous with the legalconcept of assault.

The first study reporting data on intra-family physical violence obtained bymeans of the CTS was published in 1973 (Straus, 1973). By October 1987 thisinstrument had been employed in more than a hundred papers and five books. It is also being used for assessment in clinical work. As might be expected, the largestnumber of publications (41) are by scholars associated with the Family ResearchLaboratory at the University of New Hampshire, where the instrument was developed. However, 36 empirical studies by other investigators have been located. There is also a substantial literaturecriticizing the CTS, including at least nine books and articles which devote major sectionsto the CTS. Feminists have been particularly critical of the instrument for allegedlyunderstating victimization of women and overstatingviolence by women.*2

Despite these long standing criticisms, the CTS continues to be themost widely used instrument for research on intra-family violence, including use bysome feminist critics such as Okun (1986) who employ the CTS for want of a better alternative.Thus, for better or for worse, much of the "knowledge" generated by the large volume of researchon "partner violence" is based on (or critics would say, "biased by")use of the CTS.

Objectives Of The Chapter

In view of both the wide use and the wide criticism of the CTS it is importantto have a comprehensive assessment of this instrument. Researchers need to know how to makethe most effective use of the CTS, which is not always obvious; and they needto know the limitations of the data generated bythe CTS.*3 To achieve this, the chapter:

1. Brings together and evaluates criticisms of the CTS so thatusers are informed of problems and limitations of the instrument. Sane of these criticisms willbe shown to be correct and others are erroneous.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 3 2. Describes revisions andsupplementary questions which National Family Violence were introduced in the'1985 Resurvey to deal withsome of the criticisms.

3. Presents new data on factor structure, reliabilityand validity based National Family Violence on the 1985 Resurvey and on data reported bya number of other investigators Who have used the CTS.

Appendix 2 is an extension ofthis chapter for readers who use the CTS in theirown research or clinicalpurposes. It describes and evaluates the violence items of the alternative methods ofscoring CTS which have been developedsince the original publication Chapter 3 in 1979); and also of presents comprehensive normativetables.

Description of the CTS

Readersof this chapter should first readtheChapter3, which is methodological and theoretical ale basic source on the Conflict Tactics Scales.However, by way of summary, a brief description of theCTS is given below.

The CTS measures behaviorsor tactics used in response to than the substantive issue a conflict situation, rather or "conflict of interest" givingrise to the use of these tactics. Indeed, theremay be several sources of conflict since the CTS asks respondentsto recall the times "in thepast year" when they and their partner "disagreeon major decisions, get annoyed aboutsomething the other person does, or just have spatsor fights because they're in a bad bookor tired or for some other reason."

The instructionsgo on to say "I'm go to read a list of some things thatyou and your partner might have done whenyou had a dispute and would like you to tell me for eachone how often you did it in thepast year." The list begins with theitems from the Reasoning scale, such as "Discussedthe issue calmly," goes on to the items in the VerbalAggression scale such as "Insultedor swore at the other," and ends with the Physical Aggressionor "violence" items, suchas "Threw something at the partner."

The CTS questionsare designed to be replicated for any family role-relationship. For the first National FamilyViolence Survey (Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, 1980)the CTS questions began with thetactics used by one randomly selected child in conflictswith siblings. They were then repeated for tactics used by the respondenttoward that child, by the child toward theparent, by the respondent toward his or her spouse, and bythe spouse toward the respondent, fora total of five family role-relationships. have used fewer replications Some other studies of the CTS questions (e.g.Gelles and Straus, 1988) and have used more.*4 some

There have been three versionsof the CTS: Form A was developed in 1971-72as a self- administered questionnaire.It was administered to college family of orientation during studonts who described their the year they were high schoolseniors (Straus, 1973, 1974). Form N expanded the list ofviolent acts and was used for face-to-face interviewswith a nationally representative sample of American families in 1975-76. Form R is identical, but adds choking and bilrning or scalding tothe list of violentacts and uses slightly different response categories. It also adds questionsto measure who initiated the violence and whether injuries which needed medical attentionoccurred. Form R was used for telephone interviews with a nationally representative sample in1985.

CRITICISMS OF THE CTS

Every method for obtaining data on the family has itslimitations, and the CTS is exception. Many of these limitations no arise because, when designingan instrument, it is often necessary to choose between incompatible approaches.*5 For example, both open ended

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 4 6 and fixed response categories are valid under different circumstancesand for different purposes. It is therefore important to be aware of the explicit andimplicit choices which underlie each instrumentto be able to choose the one which is most appropriate fora given purpose. Alternative procedures will be mentioned where possible,including some newly developed methods of using the CTS items to constructmeasures of intra-family violence.

Restricted To Conflict Related Violence

Form A. The statement explaining form A of the CTS(Straus,1979, Appendix 1) respondents begins: to "Here is a list of thingsyou might have done when you had or disagreement with... a conflict " This introduction implies thatonly acts of "instrumental" aggression (in this case, acts carried out as part ofa conflict or disagreement) are appropriate responses to the questions.However, a great deal of family has been called "expressive" violence is what or "hostile" aggression (Gelles andStraus, 1979), These are aggressive acts in which the goal is to hurt the victimas an end in itself. That is, there is no apparent reason for the violence except anger andhostility. Therefore, to theextent that respondents followed the literal instructions of FormA, acts of expressive aggression are not reported, producing an underestimateof the violence rate.

There were two reasons for presenting the CTS itemsas responses to conflict and disagreement. First, the CTS also measures the use of reasoning asa tactic for dealing with antra- family conflicts. Consequently, an introduction putting thequestions within a conflict framework is essential. Second, the focus on conflictsand disagreement wasone of severalmethods built intothe CTS to enhance its acceptability to respondents. "Since almost everyone recognizes thatfamilies have.conflicts and disagreements, the first step in legitimizing this serves as response." (Straus, 1979:78-79). Of course, as in many instrument design decisions, there is a price to be paid. In thiscase the price was the possible loss of dataon purely malevolent acts.

Forms N and R. Informal discussion with some respondents, however,revealed that the danger of missing purely expressive violence was not as greatas might seem. A number of respondents ignored the literal instructions and reported act of expressiveviolence; for example:"I still can't figure out what was bothering him. He justwalked in the door, slammed me against the wall and kickedme and sat down to watch TV."

No systematic investigation was done of the extent to which respondentsreported violent incidents of this type in response to Form A because, whenthe CTS create Form N (Straus, was revised to 1979, Appendix 2),the introductory statementwas augmented to specifically include expressive violence by adding the following:"...or just have spats or fights because they're in a bad mood or tired or for some other reasons."Consequently, this criticism of the CTS applies mainly to data gathered withForm A. Form N and R introductory Nevertheless, the statement continues to emphasize behaviorin response to a specific conflicts. The possibility therefore remains that the CTSunderestimate violence in the form of relatively pure acts of hostility and malevolence, butthere is no evidence that it does so toa greater extent than alternative methods.

Limited Set Of Violent Acts

Predetermined List Restricts and L imnrts. The use of a fixed set of violentacts and a standard set of response categories id a procedure which can force respondents into dealing with concepts which are alien totheir thinking and lack personalmeaning. Although this is always a possibility, it does not seem to be applicableto the CTS. The acts in the CTS were selected on the basis ofmy own qualitative interviews and suggestions by colleagues and students and all have been determined to be almostuniversally meaningful by in-depth interviews. Moreover, other investigators, includingstrident critics of the

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 5 Table I. Effect of Additional Severe Assault ItemsIn Form R Abuse and SpouseAbuse Rates on Child ------

Rate per 100 Type of Violence Form N Form R* Increase

Very Severe ViolenceAgainst Child 2.1 2.3 9.5% Severe Violence AgainstChild 10.8 11.0 1.9% Any Husband-toWifeViolence 11.6 11.6 0.0 Severe Husband-to-WifeViolence 3.2 3.4 6.3% Any Wife-to-HusbandViolence 12.4 12.4 0.0 Severe Wife-to-HusbandViolence 4.6 4.8 4.3% Any Violence Betweenthe Couple 16.0 16.1 0.6% Severe ViolenceBetween the Couple 6.0 6.3 5.0% * The violentacts in form R are identical that "burned or to those in Form N,except scalded" is addedto the list for parental "chocked" is added violence and to the list for coupleviolence.

VB6.TB,220ctober87, Page 1

8 CIS such as Dobash and Dobash(1984:274), have produced acts. an almost identical set of violent One reason these pre-determinedquestions are so broadly meaningful to overt acts, rather than is that they refer to opinions, attitudes,or beliefs. In the case overt acts, although it may also be important to determine thesubjective meaning of the primary problem is acts, the completeness and accuracy of recall. A check list of acts, such CTS tends to remind as the respondents of things which mightotherwise be forgotten and therefore results in a higher incidence of violence than open endedquestions (Smith, 1987).

Number Of Items. There must be hundreds of ways to be physicallyviolent to another family member. Yet the Violence scale of Form R is based on only nine questions,listing a total of 14 violentacts. For example, pushing a spouse down the stairs isa highly dangerous act which is not includedin the CTS.

There were several reasonsfor restricting the CTSto a relatively few acts of violence. (1) The CTS was developed for use in survey research. The length of survey interviews is limited. In addition; a large proportion of the interview timemust be used to gather data on variables to which the violence measure will berelated, such as data possible causes or on consequences of family violence. (2) The number of violence itemshad to be restricted to allow room for the items needed for the Reasoning andVerbal Aggression scales. (3) The study for which form N was developed replicated thelist of items to obtain data on violencein each of the following fiverole relationships: child-to-child, parent-to-child, child-to-parent.husband-to-wife, and wife-to-husband. of 8 x 5 That makes a total 40 violence items, whichwas believed to be the limit of patience. many respondent's

The Specific Items. There might also be objectionsto the specific items included in the CTS, and to the omission of other acts. The acts in theCTS were selected froma larger pool of items suggested by my own qualitative interviews and bycolleagues and students. The final selection was partly based on the objective ofcreating a measure that could be used to compare the amount of violence in each of the five rolerelationships listed above. This requires using a list of violent acts that is sufficientlygeneral to be appropriate for each of the five role relationships. Thus, placing someone on a hot radiator,although relevant for measuring child abuse, was not felt to be appropriateto measure violence in the other role relationships. The constraints discussed inthis and the preceding paragraph are also the reason why several violent behaviorsare included in two of the CTS items (e.g. "Kicked, bit,or hit with fist"). These acts may not be equivalent. However, even if each had been asked separately,equivalence is still problematic. the shins is not equivalent Kicking a man in to kicking in the groin, and not theequivalent of kicking a pregnant woman in ehe abdomen. This level of specificity is rarelypossible in survey research and is one of many reasons why in-depth qualitative research isneeded. The 13 violent acts ia FormN were assumed to be a sample of all possibleviolent acts. It was further assumed that even though many specific acts are not includedin the CTS, someone who engaged in an act which is not among the 13 is likely havecommitted one or more of the acts whichare in the CTS. While this may be generallytrue, there are enough exceptions to warrant increasing the list of violent actsto the extent that is possible within the constraints of a specific study (e.g., availableinterview time and respondent tolerance). We did this to a limitedextent in the 1985 National Family Violence Resurvey. The revision (Form R) consistedof adding "choked" to the list of violent acts for spouses, and "burned or scalded" to the listfor violence by parents. Table 1 shows that the additional items resulted in increasedrates. The increase is minimal or zero for the "any" violence measures because two thirds ofthe violent acts are in the minor violence category and one additional type ofsevere assault is only a small proportion of the total. However, the one additional severe violence item increasesthe rate of severe assaults by fourto nine percent.

(Table 1 about here)

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 6

9 Although the results presented in Table 1suggest that additional items reduce under-reportingsomewhat, these data will helip do not speak to themore general issue of whether the CTS itemsare a representative sample family members. of violent acts whichoccur between This issue needs to beinvestigated by qualitative with victims and in-depth interviews aggressors. However, a partial review shows that the of published qualitativestudies CTS items are almostuniversally mentioned, beginning of this but as indicatedat the section, each study alsotends to identify not in the CTS list. a few violent acts whichare For example, Dobash andDobash (1984) list "stand on" in addition "attempt to drown" and to the acts included in theCTS.

Threats Are Counted AsViolence

Several critics of the CTS have mistakenlyassumed that the item throw something" is counted "Threatened to hitor as one of the violentacts (see, for example, Dobash, 1983:271; Stark Dobash and and Flitcraft, 1983:343)despite the scoring contrary (see Chapter 3). instructions to the The threat item ispart of the verbal aggression scale. It was deliberately placed rightbefore the first of the physical aggression itemsbecause pretesting showed that ithelped respondents distinguish gives respondents between threats andovert acts. It an opportunity to first describethreats. clear the distinction Having done that, makesmore between threats andovert acts; and in the subsequentitems, which are focused on overtacts, they are less likely for actual acts of to report threats when thequestion asks overt violence.Ironically, still others havecriticized the CTS precisely because it doesnot take into account threats (c.f. Breines and Gordon,1983).

Self-Reports Are InaccurateUsing A One Year Period

Response Distortion. Allself-report measures a variety of conscious and are subject to memoryerrors and also to unconscious distortions of minimize the distortions what is reported. TheCTS attempts to by presenting theviolence items in legitimacy to respondents a context that has meaning and (see Chapter 3). The high rate ofparticipation for both interview and mailsurveys using the CTS is indirect evidence that this iseffective.

In addition, validitystudies have been carried out comparing theresponses of different family members. These show that essentially irrespective of whether the same resultsare obtained, the respondent is thehusband, the wife, (Straus, 1979: 83). or a college age child

Another approachto investigating response distortion was used witha large sample who had just completed theCTS. They were asked about their reactions to theinstrument, including whether they hadexaggerated to make it "...seem like there wasmore physical fighting than there reallywas," or played down the it seem like there fights "...so that theinterview makes was less physical fightingthan there really was." cannot tell whether the Of course, one respondents answered thesequestions accurately. But for worth, only eighttenths of a percent said what it is that they had exaggerated,and only 1.1% said that they had understatedthe amount of violence. all Still, one can be fairlysure that not respondents told all. Cross tabulatingthequestion justdescribed by self-reported violencerates shows that the the percent who said they playeddown the amount of violence is about 0.5% ofthose who reported no violence toward their childor spouse, but about 7% of those whoreported frequent severe assaults to a childor spouse. For these and other reasons (Straus,Gelles, and Steinmetz, 1980: 35-36, 64-65) theCTS violence rates high as they are-- probably uncerestimate the -- true rates by a considerableamount. Despite the underestimation of incidence rates, the rates are severaltimes higher than those produced byany other method in current use (see Chapter 5. Nevertheless, the underestimation isa limitation of the CTS when the purpose is to determinethe extent of

VB6.P,V8106,9December87, Page7 the problem forpurposes of planning prevention and treatment programs. On the other hand, When the CTS is usedto test theoretical propositions concerning causes orconsequences of violence, under-reporting will not affect these relationships providedthe degree of under- reportilg is not confounded withthe independent variable.

Referent: Period. The CTS asks respondents to indicate whetherany of the violent acts occurred during the precedingtwelve months. This is too long a periodfor accurate recall. The problem is particularly acute for the items in the Reasoningand Verbal Aggression scales, and for the minor acts of violence by parents towardchildren such as slapping. Some of these occur so often that parents would haveto keep a diary to prov'.de accurate data. On the other hand, marital violence is relatively rare--a rate of about 16% during a one year period. This is such a highly skeweddistribution thata large sample is necessary to secure enough cases of violenceto be statistically reliable. shorter referent period If a were to be used, the distribution wouldbe even more skewed (since fewer events would have occurredin a shorter period). That would require aneven larger sample. Moreover, even with a large sample, the skewed distribution limitsstatistical techniques that can be applied. Consequently, investigations of maritalviolence are faced with a difficult choice. If a one year referent period is used, the recallerror problem is exacerbated. If a shorter time period is used, recall errors will be less,but an extremely large sample size would be needed, and the resultingdata would be extremely skewed. It might be 1% versus 99% distribution if a one month referent periodis used). A one year referent period was chosen for the CTS because that seemedto be the lesser of the two evils just discussed. However, if the research is concernedwith violence between siblings, or violence by parents to children, a shorter referentperiod might be a better choice. Violence in these roles occurs with such frequency that neithera prohibitively large sample, nor an impossibly skewed distribution wouldresult for a three or six month, or perhaps evena one month, referent period.

Equates Acts That Differ Greatly InSeriousness

The violence scale items start with relatively minor acts,such as pushing and slapping, and end with assaults usinga knife or gun. The desirability of the more severe acts of violence distinguishing from the others is mentioned in theoriginal article on the CTS (Straus, 1979:77) but the importance of doing so is not givenadequate attention. Moreover, the only normative data presented in that articleare based on a simple sum. Consequently, two slaps are counted the same as two knife attacks. This omission is partly rectified in a book on the first National Family Violence Survey(Straus, Gelles, and Steinmetz, 1980). Throughout that book, separaterates are given for "severe violence." However, even the Severe Violence index may not be satisfactory becauseit also includes acts that differ greatly in their seriousness. Consequently a later section of this chapter describes three other methods for taking into account differencesin the severity of the violence items.

Context Is Ignored

One of the most frequent criticisms of the CTS is that it countsacts of violence in isolation from the circumstances under which those acts occur. Who initiates the violence, the relativesize and strength of thepersonsinvolved, and the nature of their relationship affect the meaning and consequences of the act. Hitting someone witha stove poker in self defense is different than the same physical actas an unprovoked assault. A punch by a 120 pound woman will, on the average, have differentconsequences than a punch by a 175 pound man.

These criticisms are based on a misunderstanding (or disagreement with) theapproach to research design which underlies the CTS. That approach assumes that "context" is

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 8 11 extremely important that it is essentialto measure the context variables from the violence variable. separately That is why verbalaggression is kept separate , physical aggression in the CTS. Indeed, each of the three scales is context for other (see Straus, 1974 foran example). The view that research using based on methodological the CTS ignores contextis also errors. One of these errors is the in a footnote earlier methodological monism (discussed in this chapter) whichrejects al/ therefor all research quantitative research,and using the CTS. The second error is the assumption thatquantitative research does not andcannot take context variables into account. In fact, themethods for doing so are highlydevelop(' and widely used, but effects" and "specification" go under such labels as "interaction (see Baron and Straus, 1987for an example).

Why Context Should be Assessed Separately. Thereare at several reasons for the measurement of the separating acts of violence and othertactics from the measurement context variables. of so- celled

First, the number ofcontext variables is so great that it would mikean impossibly long and cumbersome instrumentto try to include them all.

Second, many of these context variables require thedevelopment of sophisticated measures before they can be adequately measured. The design of the CTS those using it to does not restrict a particular method of measuringa context variable. choose from instruments which It permits users to are currently available or to develop context variable. their own measure ofa

Third, and most important, combining the CTS acts withthe context variables certain relationship, rather assumes a than allowing the extentto which there is such to be the subject of empirical a relationship investigation: For example, if violence measure, it precludes injury is part of the CTS investigating the extent to whichthe assaults thatare measured by the present versionof the CTS result in injuries. Although this is themost important reason for measuringcontext variables independently from assaults, it willnot be discussed further becauseof space limitations and because readerscan consult the analysis in Gelles and Straus(1979).

Methods Of Combining ContextMeasures With The CTS. Although not include so-called context the CTS deliberately does variables, as mentioned above,it is intended to provide the framework for obtaining informationon whatever context variable for a specific study or variables are needed or clinical purpose. Almost any context issue adding questions which provide can be investigated by the needed informationon the circumstances surrounding the violent incidents. If, for example, one wants to investigatethe extent to which alcohol involved in assaults is on a spouse, the interviewcan be designed to go back item that was reported over each CTS as occurring and ask if the respondentand his or her partner had been dAnking at the time, howmuch they had drunk, etc. The same principlecal be applied to investigate whether theviolence was "instrumental" or "expressive," how the respondent aar .1-,eu:, the violence, who struck the first blow, andany number of other context and lariables.

.atica on this method of obtaining context and meaningCate is the amount of 'Me. If for example, a respondent reported ten violentincidents during the . J. Wit:Lanai questions would have to be asked ten times. If this exceeds the available imerview time,an alternative method is to ask to the mos,. the context questions inrelation 'scent occurrence of the mostsevere type of assault which response to tn.. CTS violence items. was reported in This procedure was used inthe 1985 National Family Violence Resurveyto obtain data on who initiated violence, on injury, andon drinking 1.t the time of violence (seeKaufman Kantor and Straus, 1987 for an analysis of thedata on drinking as a context forviolence).

V86.P,V8106,9December87, Page 9

1.2 Igkoresthe Initiates ViolenceAnd Injuries

Some feminist critics of theCTS have been outraged by the family, women have approximately revelation that, within the the same rate of physicalassault against partners They are unwilling to as men. accept the empirical evidence fromat least a dozen studies (see Straus and Genes, 1988 fora partial review). They attempt to reconciletheir denial of female violence with theempirical data by attacking the integrity of the instrumentand those who use it,even to the point of implying deliberate distortion of the data (see the introduction to Part I).

Two of key points of attack on CTS are part of the "context"issue: fails to take into that the CTS account who initiated violence betweena couple and that it does not indicate the extent to which women are injured by assaults by theirpartners. critics of the CTS seem to Feminist assume that domestic violence andinjury are almost synonymous with male initiation and female injury, and that these factsare covered up by the design of the CTS. My view is exactly the opposite:that if the measurement of the be combined with the assumed acts were to context, makes it impossibleto prove or disproving those assumptions. Both of these important context variables will be usedto illustrate the importance of measuring contextvariables separately.

Initiation of Violence. Analyses of the 1972 and 1975 studies usingthe CTS (Straus, 1973, 1974; Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, 1980) andan independent study of a Delaware sample by Steinmetz (1977) revealed the surprisingly highrate of wife-to-partner violence, which has since been confirmed by many studies (Strausand Gelles, 1988). Straus (1980) at,ampted to determine how much of this was self-defensefrom assaults initiated by This analysis found that, men. among those couples reporting oneor more violent incidents, in about half the cases both partners engaged in assaultive behavior;in about one quarter of the cases the husband committed the only violent acts, and thatin about one quarter of the cases the wife committed the only violent acts. These findings suggested bya minimum of one quarter of all marital violence isinitiated by wives.

The 1985 National Family ViolenceResurvey approached this issue asking who initiated the more directly by most recent occurrence of themost severe of the assaultive acts in the CTS. According to the husbands, they struck the first blow in 44% of thecases, the wives hit first in 45% of the cases, and the husband could not rememberor disentangle it in the remaining 11% ofcases. According to the wives, husbands 53% of the cases, wives in struck the first blow in 42% of the cases, and theremaining 5V of wives could not disentangle who hit first. These findings show that violenceby wives cannot be dismissed on the grounds that it is in self-defense or in retaliation, and certainly provideno basis for the implication that the CTS overstates violence bywomen.

Injury. Feminist critics of the CTS argue that it overstates theviolence of women and underestimates the degree to which women are victimized by assaults on thepart of their partners by measuring violence as assaultive acts rather than by injuries. Child welfare groups have also criticized the CTS for measuring child abuse by assaultiveacts on the part of parents, rather than on by whether a child is injured. Since injury is extremely important, why is the CTS based on acts rather than injuries? The main reasons are outlined below.

Consistent With Legal Usage. The first reason for basing heuse of acts rather than injuries is consistent with the legal definition of assault,which uses acts rather than on injuries as the criterion. As Marcus (1983)puts it: "Physical contact is not an element of the crime...;" oras the Uniform Crime Reports puts it: "Attempts are included [in thetabulation of aggravated assault] because it is not necessary that an injury result..." (U.S.Department of Justice, FBI, 1985:21). However, many (or most) family violenceresearchers believe that the legal criterionis injury.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 10 13 Injury And Assault Loosely Linked. A secondreason for making acts the primary, measure of intra-family violenceis that the connection injury is far from direct. between assaults and A husband who "only" slappedhis wife may seriously injure or kill her if she fallsand hits her head on a protruding object; anda husband who intends to kill and goes after his wife witha knife will, in most instances, fail to achieve that objective. This is the basicreason why the legal definition of assault is based on the actcarried out,rather than whether an injurywas produced.

Reflects Humane Values. Consistency with legalusage, while having certain advantages, need not be a deciding factor. There have to bc! additional for focussing on acts, despite reasons the great importance ofinjuries. One of these additional reasonscan best be summarized as a moralor humane values criterion. I take the view that it should not benecessary for a spouse or child to be injured to classify behavior as abusive. From the perspective of this value orientation, punching a spouse or a child is inherentlywrong, even though no injuryoccurs.

Ignores Psychological Injury. Another reason for usingacts to measure of child abuse and spouse abuse is that some of the most seriousinjuries are likely to be psychological, and therefore not easily observed.For children this include low self-esteem, can aggressiveness, and delinquency(Hotaling and Straus, 1988); and for wives "learned helplessness,"depression, and suicide (Gelles and Straus,1988). In a typical investigation,it is possible to include measures of only a few of the possible psychological injuries, thusalmost inevitably underestimating the extent of psychological injuryresulting from physical abuse.

Provides A More Realistic Measure of the Problem. Another reason for the use acts as contrasted with injuriesas the measure of intra-family violence out of the fact that most grows assaults, even severe assaults,do not result in an injury which needs medicalattention. In the case of physical child example, abuse for more than 95% of the casesare children who are being assaulted, but who nonetheless seriously do not require medicalcare for the physical injuries (Garbarino, 1986Runyon, 1986). In the case of battered 1985 National spouses, the family Violence Resurveyfound that therewere no injuries requiring medical attention in 99.3% of thecases of minor violence and in 95.5% of the cases involvinga severe assault. Thus statistics basedon injury would underestimate the extent of spouse assault bya huge amount.*6

The same considerations apply to physical abuse ofchildren, and even more sexual abuse of children. to These are inherentlywrong, regardless of whether the child physically or psychologically injured. Many children are kicked thrown against a wall or every day in every Americanstate, but only a small proportion will sustain a concussion or other injuryserious enough to require medical attention. Consequently, if a medicallytreatable injury were to be one of the criteria for child abuse, the true incidence of childabuse would be underestimated almost as much by the CTS as by the officialstatistics.

More Useful For Planning_ Prevention Programs. Attemptsto measure intra-family violence on the basis of injuries., either physicalor psychological, will produce statistics indicating a vastly lower rate of violence thanactually occurs. This is not merely a matter of record keeping. It denies to those who formulate and implement public policy a realistic assessmentof the extent of the task, and therefore impedes planning and implementingprograms of primary preventicn.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 11

14 Despite these arguments, for certain purposes, such as estimating the need for emergency medical services by abused childrenor wives,data on injuries is the most appropriate measure. In addition, it is importantto recognize that the use of assaultive acts rather than injuries as the criterion for measuring violenceposes a serious problem for communication of research resultswith the general public. The public tends to think of child abuse and wife-beating phenomena as indicating an injured childor spouse. Researchers who use the CTS with a view to providing information relevant for publicpolicy formation need to keep this problem mindto avoid serious misunderstandings.

"Minor" Versus "Severe" Categories DistortGender Differences

The physical violence items in the CTS are classified into two levels ofseverity: "minor violence" (items K, L, and M, which includes: pushed, grabbed, shoved, slapped,and threw things at the other person), and "severe violence" (item Non, which include kicked, bit, punched, hit with an object, beat up, choked, threatened witha knife or gun, used a knife or gun). The distinction between thetwo levels of violence is basedon the assumption that the items in the severe violence category are more likely tocause an injury which requires medicaltreatment.

The original purpose of this distinctionwas to permit an estimate of the extent of "child abuse" and "wife-beating" in the United States, and to identifysuch cases for further analysis. The need for this distinctionis clearest in the case of child abuse. The criterion for child abuse is not simply hitting a child; rather it requiresa level of assault which does or is likely to physically injure the child, and this is whatthe severe violence items are intended torepresent.

In the case of violence between spouses, the common law right of husbandsto "physically chastise an errant wife" (Calvert,1974; Straus, 1976) no longer exists, but (at least at the time the CTS was developed)the public,in effect, still made that distinction. "Only" slapping or shoving a wife -is not "wife-beating" as most peoplesee it. Consequently, the distinction between the minor violence and the severe violence itemsis also useful in identifying cases which approximate the concept of wife-beating. This enables the incidence rate for wife-beating to be estimated, and also permitsa researcher to distinguish between spouses who are victims of minor violence versus those who havebeen more severely assaulted.

Although the distinction between minor violence and severe violence is importantand probably necessary, there are two related problems, both of whichgrow out of the fact that men, on average, are three inches taller thanwomen, weigh 28 pounds more, and have better developed muscles.

Understates Male Violence. The basic problemis that 0 slap or a punch bya 190 pound man is likely to be much more severe thana slap or a punch by a 125 pound woman, yet the CTS counts them as though they were the same. Moreover, being repeatedly slapped is highly abusive and dangerous, but the standard scoring of the CTS counts thatas minor violence.

Inprinciple it is possible to score theCTS in ways which correct the underestimation of male violence. To correct for differences in the heightand weight of each spouse, this information can be obtained, and the ratio of the height and weightof each spouse to the other spouse can be used to weight the CTS scores. The score could be increased by the percent to which the height and weight of the respondent exceededthat of his or her spouse.

To correct for repeated slapping,a respondent who exceeds a certain level could be classified as having engaged insevere violence,even though he or she may not have committed one.of the acts in thesevere violence list. This procedure used by Hotaling and

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 12 Straus (1988) to producean improved measure of child abuse. using this measure, however, The results of the analysis were almost identical to the resultsof measuring child abuse. using only the severe violenceacts.

Overstates Severe ViolenceBy Women. A frequent scenario in the husband is "only" marital violence is that slapping or shoving. Fear or anger then leads the even the odds by kicking, punching, wife to attempt to or using an object. In the CTS violence husband is counted scores, the as having engaged in minor violence,whereas the wife is counted having engaged ina severe assault. as Critics of the CTSargue that this artificially overstates violence bywomen.

In my opinion, the realmeaning of this criticism is that the "context" (i.e.being attacked by someone ofgreater size and strength) justifies the use of these acts bywomen. To the extent thatwomen use acts of severe violence in self-defense, that iscorrect. To the extent thatwomen are retaliating, the self-defense justification is not present.

Does Not Measure Process Andsequence

The CTS is basically intended to measure the extent to which were used during a given time each of the three tactics period, such as the precedingyear or month and therefore does not provide informationon the specific interaction use of any of the tactics in the sequence which was involved in the scale. There are, however, used to ways in which the CTS can be investigate processes andsequences, such as what leads violence. to escalation into One method is to readministerthe CTS at specified quarters, or years and then intervals, such as months, use standard methods of panelanalysis. supplement the standard CTS Another method is to items with questionson the sequence of events. after completing the CTS, For example, respondents can be asked aboutthe sequence of events up to the most coercive act which whifil led was reported to have occurred and information about the to provide further nature of the conflict and howit was ultimately resolved.

Does Not Identify A ClinicallyMeaningful Population

The findings of research based on administration ofthe CTS to random samples population may be misleading of the if the goal is touncover relationship which into treatment and prevention can be translated program steps-.This problem can arise "clinical" populations (such if the relevant as women who seek assistance froma shelter) are qualitatively different than women whoare classified as being abuse victims on the basis ofreporting having been victims ofone or more of the "severe violence acts in the CTS. A similar problem occurs with communityepidemiological surveys of in the case of assaulted alcoholism and mental illness.As women, the population classifiedas "alcoholic" or "depressed" is much greater than the population being treated for these problems.Moreover, as might also be the case for familyviolence, many of the social and psychological characteristicsof persons intreatmentfor alcoholism and depression arequite different characteristics of the populations thanthe identified as alcoholicor depressed in community surveys (Room, 1980). This mightexplain the discrepancy between by wives in random sample the high rate of violence studies, and the lowrate of such violence in shelter samples. client

Even if shelter clients are not qualitatively different,the average amount of violence experienced by these women is much greater than theexperience of wife-beating victims identified by community surveys using theCTS. For example, the mean number of assaults experienced by female victims of spouse-assault inthe 1985 National Family Violence Researchwas "only" 5.5 compared to 29?? forthe shelter clients studied Giles-Sims (198??) or ?? for by the shelter clients studiedby Okun (19? ?). Oppenheimer (1987) has recently Moreover, as shown,it is difficult to select a directly comparable

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 13

16 subset of spouse-assault victims from the 1985survey because, out of the 622 assaulted women, only 20 experienced 29?? or more assaults during the year of thesurvey

These differences raise serious questions about the applicabilityof survey findings using the CTS to clinical populations, and about thereasons why so few cases whichare comparable to a clinical population are identified by the CTS. Perhaps the incidence for such high levels of violence rate is extremely low, and thereforetoo few such cases are identified even by a sampleas large as 6,002. A more plausible explanation is extremely high violence that the cases are under-represented because theyare a more transient and lower income population and therefore more difficult tocontact; or because they makeup a disproportionately large part of the eligible respondents who refusedto be interviewed. Finally, it should be noted thatthese are problems associated with with the CTS per se. community surveys, not Indeed, the best evidenceon this issue comes from the application the CTS to clinical samples, of as in the research of Giles-Sims (19??)and Okun (19??).

THE CTS AS A MEASURE OF CHILD ABUSE

The CTS measure of physical child abuse has made possiblesome important advances in knowledge of the incidence of child abuse (Gelles, 1978,Straus, 1983; Chapter 7 of this book), risk factors associated with child abuse (Straus, 1979;Straus and Kaufman Kantor, 1986), effects of physical abuse on the child the child (Hotaling andStraus, 1988) and change over time in incidence rates (see Chapter 4). Nevertheless, the CTS has beenused much less often to study violence by parents than it has beento study violence by spouses. This section describes the indexes which have been developed tomeasure parental violence, identifies certain shortcoming of the CTS for thispurpose, and suggests methods of correcting these shortcomings.

The CTS Physical Punishmentand Physical Abuse Indexes

The Overall Violence Index (sum of CTS items K to S in Form Ra-nd items K to R if form N) isnot very useful as a measure of parent-to-child violence becausein combines normatively permissible acts of violence (slapping and spanking)with acts which are not permissible and highly dangerous (kicking, burning, attacks withweapons, etc.) To deal with thisproblem, four indexes have been developed, and are described in thenext section.7

The Minor Violence Index As A Measure of Physical Punishment.The Minor Violence index combines items K, L, and M of Forms N and R (threw things at thechild, pushed grabbed shoved, slapped or spanked). or It can be used as ameasure of "physical punishment." However, the ambiguity of the concept of physical punishment needsto be kept in mind. The are no standard legally recognized criteria for physical punishment,nor even a requirement that the child not be physically injured (see supreme court case???).In addition, as is generally the case with the CTS violence items, we do not know theintensity of each of the acts. For example, slapping can range from something thatcauses only a minute amount of pain to a blow which causes a hemotoba, and the object throwncan range from a pillow to a rock. It would take a much longer instrument than the CTS to deal withthese problems. Despite these shortcomings, the research reported in chapters 6, 7 and 20shows the utility of the CTS as a measure ofphysical punishment.

Physical Abuse. From a strictly scientific perspective it wouldbe preferable to avoid the term "abuse" because itis a political and administrative term as much or more thana scientific term. Moreover the concept of "abuse" is a source of considerabledifficulty and confusion because it covers many types of maltreatment inaddition to acts of physical violence, and because there is no consensus on the severity of violencerequired for an act to be considered "abuse." Despite this, "abuse" will be usedfor two reasons. First, it

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 14 is less awkward than terms such as "Very SevereViolence Index." widely used term that Second, abuse is sucha avoiding it creates communicationdifficulties. As suggested above, what constitutes abuse is primarilya matter of social administrative practice. norms and Spanking or slappinga child, or even hitting object such as stick, a child with an hair brush, or belt, isnot "abuse" according to either informal norms of American the legal or society, although it isin Sweden and several (Haeuser, 1985). The CTS operationalization other countries of child abuse attemptsto take such normative factors into considerationby giving users the choice draws the line between among two measures, each of which physical punishment and physicalabuse at a different point.

The two indexes used tomeasure child abuse each consist of acts that havea relatively high probabilityof causing an injury. Thus, kicking is classifiedas severe violence because kickinga child has a much greater potential for producing an injurythan an act of "minor violence" suchas spanking or slapping.8

Very Severe Violence. This measure of physical abuse by a parent of of children focuseson the use any of the following CTS items, eachof which are almost regarded as indicators of "abuse" universally N. Kicked/bit/hit with fist; P. Beat up; Q. Burned or scalded (Form R only), R.Threatened with a knife or gun; and S. Used gunor knife. The Very Severe Violenceindex is probably the most useful for administrativepurposes because it comes closest to thetype of cases which are classified as physical abuse by the Child Protective Service agenciesof each of the states.

Severe Violence. Although the Very Severe Violenceindex may be the most measure for purposes of estimating suitable the rate or number ofchildren in need of official intervention, it underestimatesthe rate and number of children who are beingseverely assaulted because it excludesCTS item 0 "hit or tried to hit with something." The something is usuallya traditionally sanctioned object such as a hair brushor belt, and this is thereason it was omitted from the Very Severe Violence Index. However, if the object of an attack witha hair brush or belt were another adult, it would be considereda serious assault, andone can argue that this same standard should apply tochildren. Severe Violence indexdoes just that. The The rate of physicallyabused children, when measured by the SevereViolence Index, is almost five times greater thanwhen the Very severe Violence Index is used (seeChapter 5).

Severity Weighted Parent Violence Scale.This scale takes into frequency and the severity account both the of assaults on childrenby their parents. sense of injury producing potential) Severity (in the is indicated bya weight of from one to eight items K through S. The scale is computed for by multiplying the weightfor each item by the frequency with which itoccurred, and summing the product. This procedure assignsa much higher score to childrenwho are attacked with a weapon than to those whoare slapped or spanked, and at thesame time allows for the fact that is abusive. Since the very frequent slapping or spanking Severity Weighted Scaleis a continuous variable, it know where to set the is difficult to cutting point fora level of violence that should be abusive. There is considered as an obvious need for researchon this issue.

Under-Utilization of The CTS InChild Abuse Research

Despite the many research possibilities made possible bythe four indexes described the previoussection, in researchers who are notassociated withthe Laboratory of the University Family Research of New Hampshire, haveused the CTS to study child less often than they have abuse much used it to measurespouse abuse. 40 other investigators Specifically, whilemore than have used the CTS tomeasure assaults against partners in cohabiting,or marital relationship, a dating, only seven studiesnot connected tothe Family Research Laboratory have usedthe CTS as a measure of child abuse (see Chapter, Table2).

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 15

18 The reasons why relativelyfew studies of child abuse have Scales fall into two used the Conflict Tactics categories. One categoryconsists of problems associated compartmentalization of research with the on child abuse and spouse abuse, each ofwhich tends to be studied by a differentgroup of researchers who are not familiar aspects with researchon other offamily violence (Finkelhor, 1983). These will becalled"institutional impediments." The other category consists of shortcomings of the CTSas a means of measuring physical abuse of children.

Institutional Impediments

1, Differentiated Communication Channels. The 1979 articlewhich has servedas the "test manual" for this instrument,although it describes the method of child abuse, devotes of computing ameasure more attention to use of the CTS instudying marital violence. For example, the sample page giving the CTS items gives the wordingused when these items refer to a couple, rather than toparents and children. In addition, this articlewas published in a journal which is by researchers interested in marriageand the family, rather than a journal such as Child Development in where it would more likely havecome to the attention of child abuse researchers.

2. Alternative Data Available. Investigators concerned with child sources of data: abuse had alterative the cases reported to ChildProtective Services in each of the under the mandatory child abuse states reporting laws(American Association For Children, Protecting 1986), and the so-called"National Incidence Study" of Center On Child abuse and child abuse (National Neglect,1981). Moreover,they tended to prefer these alternatives because each counted cases known to child welfare professionalsand may therefore have been regardedas "real cases."*9

3. Measures Acts Rather ThenInjuries. Child Protective welfare workers tend Services and other social to emphasize injuriesas the criterion for abuse. between acts and injury based The relation measures, and the importance of usinga measure based on acts (such as the discussion inthis chapter) is not part of the original articleon the CTS. 4. Requires A Decision About What Constitutes ChildAbuse. The CTS acts spanking to attacks with range from weapons. It therefore forces theuser to draw a line between physical punishment and abuse, which is difficult and willbe criticized at point the line is drawn. no matter what This problem is avoided (becauseit is left to case workers interpret the often vague statutes) to if the "official statistics"on chid abuse are used. Nor does it occur in researchon marital violence because there is hitting is abuse. wide consensus that any

Shortcomings Of The CTS For MeasuringChild Abuse

The original version of the CTS (Form A) was designedto measure violence between parents and their teen age childrenand violence between the teen age child. parents as reported by the The next revision (Form N)was used in a survey which was confined children age 3 and older. to However, physical abuse of childrenoccurs at least as often amonginfants and toddlers(Wauchope and Straus, 1987) andthe CTShas important shortcomings a measure of physical abuse for child thisyoung, including the following:

1, Reasoning Items Not Appropriate. The versions of theCTS developed to date begin with items that are not considered appropriate for infants andone-year-olds; specifically, the items in the Reasoning scale, such as "Discussed theproblem calmly."

2. Minor Acts Of Violence For A Six Year Old are DangerousFor A Six Month Old Child. Spanking or shoving a child of six is appropriately labeledas minor violence, but can be

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 16 19 life threatening for an infant. The present proceduresfor classifying and scoring the child abuse an act as abusive scale do not take thatinto account.

3 A Different List OfActs is Needed For Infants And Toddlers. Some of the acts at the severe endmay be redundant, for example threatening an infant witha knife or gun. the other hand,acts which are extremely On dangerous to infants, suchas shaking, are not part of the CTS list ofviolent acts.

4. Age-Specific NormsLacking. The table of norms published as part of the1979 article on the CTS doesnot provide separate figures this is a highly age-related for children of differentages, yet phenomenon (Wauchope andStraus, 1987).

In view of these problems,and in view of the wide belief that one mustuse an instrument in unmodified formor not at all, it is :lot surprising used much less often that the CTS has been to measure child abuse thanother aspects of intra-family However, each of the problems violence. listed above can be dealtwith by relatively modifications. straightforward We have already madea first step in that direction and do the same. For example, a recent encourage others to survey conducted for the New HampshireTask Force on Prevention of Child Abuseby Moore and Straus (1987) dropped the reasoning itemswhen the referent child wasan infant or a one year old. In the future we planto substitute age- appropriate items such "Pickedup the child and hugged him/her." This can be done by building in to the interviewdesign "filters" or "branching" instructionsdirecting the interviewer to askone version of the questions if the child is a certainage and anther version if the child isanother age. This is a standard and research. well proven practice insurvey

ALTERNATIVE MEASURES OFINIRA-FAMILY VIOLENCE

Although the evidenceto be presented below shows that the CTS isa reasonably reliable and validmeans of determining the nature and extent of intra-familyviolence, a number of modificationsas well as completely different methods have been used.

Single Questions. ShortForms. And Modifications

Different studies have addedand subtracted items and the results seem to beroughly consistent with the resultsfrom use of the CTS. Illustrative of this is thestudy by Scanzoni (1978) who askeda sample of 321 women "How often does his refusal to listen, do what you want himto do, make you so or angry that you: Swear at him;Try to hit him; Ignore him or give him thecold shoulder, stamp your feet or hit something likea table or a wall; Do something to spitehim." Fourteen percent of thewomen indicated that they had tried to hit the husband. Since this figure referees to the entire period of themarriage, not to the immediately preceding12 months, it cannot be compareddirectly to the 12 percent of women in the NationalFamily Violence Resurvey who reported having hittheir husband in the pastyear.However, it does indicate that even relatively simpletechniques can be used to obtain dataon marital violence.

Other researchers haveadded items to the CTS, and some have dropped items. It has been used in the form ofa questionnaire (Form A, Straus, (Form N, Straus, Gelles, 1973, 1974), personalinterview and Steinmetz, 1980) andtelephone interview (Straus 1986). and Gelles,

The CTS has also been used to measure conflicttactics in a wide variety of relationships, role including parent-child, child-child, child-parent,husband-wife, wife- husband, and alsomen and women dating and cohabiting partners. The respondent has also varied, including childrendescribing their own behavior and that of theirparents; and husbands, wives, anddating partners, describing the tactics used bythemselves and by

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 17

20 ,their partner. Afford (1982) used a modification of the CTS to obtaininformation on conflict tactics used in 26 different role-relationships, bothfamilial and non-family.

It is clear that the CMcan be modified and used in a wide variety of ways. However, if the intent isto measure conflict tactics as defined in Chapter 3, andas summarized in the introductionto this chapter, two principles need to be followed: (1) Include only acts of overt behavior. Beliefs and attitudes about violence, forexample, are extremely important, but since they are far from the same thing as actualviolence (Dibble and Straus, 1980), they should be measured by a separate scale, suchas the one developed by Sanders et al (1987). (2) Do not mix tactics, eitherin the phrasing of combining items to computing an item, or in a scale. Alford's "Fight 3" category, for "yell, scream, push, shove, example, combines hit, throw things, and makeextremely insulting references" (Alford, 1982). Consequently it is impossible to differentiate between parentsor spouses who use verbal aggressionbut who do not physically assault their child orspouse, from those who are both verbally andphysically aggressive.

Child Abuse Measures

Although as mentioned in a previous section, the CTS has certaindeficiencies as a measure of physical abuse of children (someof which will be rectified the planning stage), in a study now in no satisfactory alternatives have yet beendeveloped. This section briefly reviews some of the other methods which have beenused in research on physical abuse of children:

Child Protective Services Rate. Annual statistics are compiledon the number of child abuse cases reported to the Child Protective Services underthe mandatory reporting laws which are in effect in all the states (American Association forProtecting Children, 1986). These are the most widely known and widely accepted statisticson child abuse in the United States. The 1984 rate for physical abuse was estimated by Strausand Gelles (1988) to be 0.68 per hundred children. By contrast, the CTS rate is2.3 percent for "Child Abuse-1" and 11 percent when using the "Child Abuse-2" measure (seesection on scoring methods for the difference between these two measures). Thus the CTS rate for the more severe assaults on children is 3.4 times greater than the CPS rate, and the CTSrate for the more inclusive measure of physical abuseis 16 times greater than the CPS.

National Incidence Study. This study attempted to findout about all known cases of child abuse in a sample of 26 counties surveyed in 1980 (NationalCenter on Child Abuse and Neglect, 1981). The procedure went beyond theofficial reporting system described also collecting data above by on cases known to personnel in communityinstitutions (schools, hospitals, police, courts), irrespective of whether thecases had been officially reported. It produced a physical abuse rate of 3.4 percent children. This was about 26% higher than the rate of officially reported cases of physical abuse in1980 (the CPS rate hasgone up tremendously since then because the new attention to sexual abuse has producedan influx of cases), but is still much lower than the rate from the surveys usingthe CTS.

One way to interpret the differences between the rates produced by theCTS and those produced by the two methods just described is to say that comparisonof these two rates with the rate obtained using the CTS in two nationalsurveys shows that there are from several times more physically abused children in the UnitedStates than receive help. The same point can also be expressed in the terminology used by epidemiologist,i.e., the discrepancy between the Child Protective Services rate and theCTS rates of child abuse occurs because each measures a somewhat different phenomena. The rate obtained by counting the numberof cases known to ChildProtective Services and other human service professionals is more a measures of intervention or treatment thanan incidence rates (see Straus and Gelles, 1986 for furtherexplanation).

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 18 Prediction Instruments. There have been a number of instruments developed toidentify parents who have a higher thannormal risk of abusing their children. Theseinstruments, differ from each other ina number of ways which cannot be of space. For example, discussed here because oflack the Adult - AdolescentParenting Inventory (ASPI) of emphasizes the overt behavior Bavoleck (1984) of the parent toward thechild and includes sub-scales use of physical punishment, for inappropriate expectations, lack The Child Abuse Potential of empathy, and rolereversal. Inventory (CAP) of Milner, 1986)on the other hand emphasizes the personality of the parent and includes sub-scalesfor Distress, Rigidity, Problems with child and self, Unhappiness, Problems with family.andProblems from others. instruments are reviewed in Other Schneider, Helfer, andHoffmeister (1980). Despite occasional use of terminology whichsome might suggest otherwise, instrument do not measure the these occurrence of acts of physical abuse. For example, Milner's CAP results inan overall measure called the "Abuse Scale." However, mne of the items refer to physical abuse,nor should they. This is because the instrument isa tool for prevention work, and is intendedto identify parents at risk actually occurs. of being abusive before it

There is a certain irony in thefact that these instruments programs designed to provide services were developed for use in which can aid high riskparents avoid having the risk becoming a reality. The irony is that these instruments are more appropriatefor research than for preventionprograms. The problem is not deficiencies in the instrumentsper se. The CAP, for example,exemplifies sound psychometric techniques, including validitystudies presented with commendableclarity inthe test manual.The problemis instruments run up against the thatthese bed rock of the highincidence of "false positives" in predictiiig any phenomenon inherent with a low incidencerate (Light, 1973). administered the CAP For example, Milner to abusing parents and toa comparison group. analysis correctly classified The discriminant 93% of parents. Assuming93% accuracy and clinically identifiable child an incidence of abuse of 2%, applicationof the CAP to all community would correctly parents in a identify two out ofevery 100 children as at high risk and incorrectly identify of abuse seven. Thus, 78% of thecases assessed would be falsely labelled (cf. Light 1973, p.571 forestimation procedures).

Parenting Behavior Inventories. A somewhat related type ofmeasure are instrument designed to identifyparents who use child rearing techniques which are knownor believed to be antecedents of physicalabuse

Medical Diagnosis. The paper of C. Henry Kempeet al (1962), which helped medical and public attention mobilize on child abuse described theuse of x ray and other medical diagnostic techniquesto distinguish between children who are the victims ofaccidental injury and those whoare the victims of inflicted injuries. Studies of children admitted to emergency departments ofurban hospitals for accidental such children ae abuse injury suggest that about 10%of victims. However, other studies (reviewed have produced far lower in Pless et al, 1987) figures. Regardless of which rate is evaluating children admitted correct, protocols for to emergency rooms (suchas the SCAN Sheet described in Pless et al, 1987) are extremely important because theycan identify children whoare in the greatest need for protectiveservices. Unfortunately, 30 years afterKempe's paper, only a minority of hospitals consistencyuses such protocols.

On the other hand, even if all hospitals were touse a child abuse detection protocol, it would still leave undetected more than 95% ofphysically abused children. This because, as noted in the is previous discussion of why theCTS is based on assaults rather than injuries,less than five percent of child abuse cases knownto Child Protective Services involve an injury that is serious enoughto need medical attention. physically abused children (as Most contrasted to thecases which make front page headlines) involve repeated severe beatings, but not injuries. These are children and need of assistance, but parents in dire not medical assistance. Consequently, hospital based methods are not a substitute detection for an instrument suchas the CTS. Instruments such as the

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 19 22 CTS are essential for epidemiological surveys, for testing causaltheories, and for Program evaluationresearch.

Spouse Abuse Measures

The CTS has been most widely used and most widelycriticized as an instrument measure violence between spouses. However, to as in the case of instrumentsto measure child abuse, no satisfactory alternativehas as yet been developed.

Alford (1982), for example developed an instrumentto measure "dispute styles" and which he describes as "similar in some respects" to the CTS.This instrument has useful features, some such as measuring the degreeof intimacy of the relationship frequency of contact with the and the other person in the relationship. However, as explained above,it confounds verbal aggression and physical aggression ina way which makes it impossible to determinea violence rate or violence score.

The Index of Spouse Abuse (Hudson and McIntosh, 1981)was developed with commendable use of appropriate statistical techniques, such as factor analysis, andeach of the two sub-scales (Physical Abuse and Non-Physical Abuse) have highreliabilities. However, this instrument suffers from the same fundamental problem as Alford'smeasure of dispute styles: it confounds physical aggression with other variables. Inspection of the items in the Physical Aggression scale of the Index of Spouse Abuse(as given in the footnote Appendix 1 in Hudson and to McIntosh) shows that only fourof the eleven items physical aggression. are acts of The remaining itemsare certainly abhorrent behavior partner becbmes surly and (e.g. "My angry if I tell him he is drinkingtoo much"), but are not acts of physical aggression. Teas, if the instrument is scoredaccording to Hudson and McIntosh's directions, there is no way of differentiatinga violent spouse from one who is verbally abusive, butnot violent.

National Crime Survey. Thissurvey provides the most extensive data assaults between members of available on thesame housr.,hold because it is basedon a sample of approximately 60,000 households and is repeated annually.It is also an extremely carefully conducted survey. Nevertheless, the National Crime Surveyrate is drastically lower rate of spouse abuse found by the National Family Violence Resurvey:two tenths of a percent (Gaquin, 1977-78). By comparison, the CTS rate of 16.1percent is more than 50 times higher.

The huge discrepancy between the National Crime Survey(NCS) rate of .2 and the CT3 rate of 16.1 raises the question of why the NCS rate isso low. The most likely reason for the tremendous discrepancy lies in differenc,,s between thecontext of the NCS versus the other studies. The NCS is presented to respondents as a study of crime, whereas the others are presentedas studies of family problems. The difficulty witha "crime survey" as the context for determining incidence rates of intra-family violence is thatmost people think of being kicked by theirspouse as wrong, but not a "crime" in the Thus, only a minute proportion legal sense. of assaults byspouses are reported in the National Survey. Cr-,me

Emergency Room Protocols. Many victims of family violencepresent to a hospital emergency room for treatment. However, the fact that the injury not divulged. was intentional is usually Moreover, even when it is divulged,or there are indications of intentional injury, it tends to be ignored (Stark, Flitcraft, Zuckerman,and Gray, 1981). have there Protocols fore been developed toidentify batteredwomen so that more appropriate treatment and referral can be provided (McGrath, et al., 1980). One such protocol was used to examine case records at Yale-New Haven hospital and concluded thatabout 20% of female trauma cases were the result of intentionalinjuries (Stark et al. 1981). These indicate that emergency findings room protocols are important proceduresfor purposes of bein, able to provide treatment and referrals andshould be much more widely used.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 20 23 Emergency room protocols can also be used to identifycases for research, particularly, in-depth analyses andlongitudinal analyses. However, since onlya small fraction of battered women are injuredseriously enough to require medical attention (seediscussion of injury earlier in thechapter), incidence rates based underestimate the prevalence on such cases will seriously of wife-beating. Nevertheless, if the phenomenon being one is careful to define measured as "women whoare beaten seriously enough treatment" and if the fact to require medical that this level of injuryis rare even among severely women is made clear, this would be assaulted an extremely useful figurein any community.

Randomized Response Technique. This technique has beenhighly touted foruse in surveys on sensitive subjects (Kolata,1987), but has not yet been extensively testedin measuring physical assaultwithin the family. The techniquewas first developed by Warner (1965) and later modifiedby others. In its most commonly asked two unrelated used format, respondentsare questions,one sensitive and the other randomizing device (like not, and then givensome flipping a coin) for decidingwhich question to researcher does not know answer. The which question the respondentis actually replying know the overall odds with to but does which each question willbe answered. knows the prevalence of If the researcher also the non-sensitive characteristic(because it is fixed in population,like being born the in September, or becauseit can be determined from sources), then the prevalence other of the sensitive characteristic can be readily calculated. The theory, the techniqueis attractive because the researcher can promise therespondent complete anonymity ofresponse. (Detailed guides to 1986 ) use of the technique is Tracy& Fox,

The technique has beenused at least twice in regard to child abuse. Zdep and Rhodes (1976) estimated that 15%of a national probability sample of 2000 responded"yes" to the question, "Have youor your spouse ever intentionally used physical forceon any of your children in an effortspecifically meant to hurt or cause injury to that child?" Finkelhor & Lewis (1987) obtainedestimates of 17% and 4% to split samples of 1313in a national probability survey inresponse to the question "Have you ever sexually abuseda child at any time in your life" However, the divergence of their two estimates and theabsence of associations with any otherexpected characteristics of Lewisto conclude that sexual abusers led Finkelhor& theestimates probablywere not valid. technique does offer Randomized response some intriguing possibilitiesfor family violence more testing is required before concluding researchers, but that it can produce validand reliable results.

RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY

Reliability

Six studies assessing the internal consistencyreliability of the CTS have located and are summarized been in Table 2. Comparison of the columns the three tactics shows for the scales measuring that the Alpha coefficientsare low for the Reasoning scale, for Verbal Aggression, and higher highest for the Violencescale. The differences function of the number of are largely a items in each scale. The reasoning scale in only three items. Forms N and R have Consequently, as suggestedin the earlier article as Chapter 3), for research in on the CTS (reprinted which measurement ofreasoning is an important focus, reasoning items dropped from the Form A (because of theinterview length limitations studies using Forms N and of the R) should be restoredto the version used in In fact, still other items any such studies. can be added to both the Reasoningand the Verbal Aggression scales to the extent thatthey figure importantly in the study for which theCTS is used.

(Table 2 about here)

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 21 24. Factor Structure Of the CIS At the time the CTS was developed, the three tactics whichserved as the basis for designing items to be included were hypothesized dimensions. Several investigators have since confirmed the existence of these dimensions though theuse of factor analysis. the extent that factor To analysis identifies these dimensions,it supports the original conceptualization. In addition, the identification oforthogonal factors provides of the "discriminant validity" evidence (Fisk 8nd Campbell, 19??) of thethree tactics.

Straus Analyses. Chapter 3 reports the results of a factor analyzedthe data from Form A, completed by a sample of 385 college students withreference to the tactics used by their parents during the last year they lived at home. The results correspond 1:1th the theoretical grouping of the items: the analysis produced threefactors which correspond to the three hypothesized dimension: reasoning, verbal aggression, and (violence). physical aggression The factor loadings for each itemare given in Table 1 of that Chapter.

Chapter 3 also reports the results of a factor analysis of FormN for the 1975 national sample of 2,143 families. This analysis yielded thesame three factors, and an additional factor. The items with the highest loadings on this factorare. the use of a knife or gun. The factor loadings for the other violence itemsgo down as the severity of the violence decreases. This suggests that the additionalfactor represents the Severe Violence index described in the section on scoring methods.It further suggests that the "minor violence" of family life is a somewhat distinct phenomenonfrom the repeated and severe assaults which characterize "wife-beating."

Jorgensen (1977) analyzed Form A data and found three factorswhich he labeled high medium and low intensity factors. The "high intensity" factorconsists entirely of items involving physical assault, the "medium intensity" factor consistsof acts of verbal or symbolic aggression (insulting, stomping out of, the house, etc.)and the "low intensity" factor consists entirely of items from the reasoninggroup. Jorgensen's factor analysis therefore produced a factor structure which also confirms theoriginally hypothesized dimensions,

Gully et al, (1981) administered the Form N violence itemsK through SR to a sample of 335 undergraduates in order to measure violence in seven familyrole-relationships (e.g. parent-parent, parent-sibling, sibling-sibling). Since Gully et al. did not items from the Reasoning and Verbal administer Aggression scales, their factor analysis is comparable to the other analyses not reported in this section. Their analysis of the violence scores identified seven two factors: sibling violence andparent violence.

Hornung, McCullough. and Sugimoto (1981) analyzed the CTS responses ofa random sample of 1,793 women in Kentucky (Schulman, 1979). They replicated the analysisfor the woman's behavior, the man's behavior, and items which combined both. Al]. three analyses yielded for factors: reasoning, "psychological abuse," "physical aggression," and "life- threatening violence." The differentiation of theviolence items into minor anda severe violence factors is parallel to the findings from the analysisof Form N by Straus (1979) described above.

Sack, Keller and Howard (1982 carried out a factor analysis thatis similar in some respects to the analysis described above in that they factored CTS indexesrather than the CTS items. The 12 variables in their analysis consist of the scoreson the three CIS indexes for each of four family role - relationships. This procedure identified three factors: Non-Violent Conflict Tactics, Premarital Aggression, andParental Aggression.

Eblen (1987) modified Form N to include more specific disciplinarytechniques (such as "grounded you" and "sent you to your room") with a sample of 513children in 5th through 8th grade. Separate factor analyses were computed for the behaviorof the fathers and the mothers (as reported by the child). For fathers, the first factorconsisted entirely of acts of physical violence, plus "threatened to hit or throw something." For mothers, the

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 22 first factor consisted of the violence itemsand also two "Threw you out of the acts of verbal aggressionand house." The second factor measuring "normal for both parentswas identified as discipline' because it"Sent you to your room," at you,"Slapped or spanked "Grounded you," "Yelled you." The third factor had items for fathers. high loadingson th2 four rezoning For mothers, thethird factor included "Cried" and twonew items which also measured some reasoning items, plus the mothers negativeaffect. Farling et al.(1987) administered Form N married couples. as modified by Hornunget al. (1981) to 585 The factor analysisfor the data from aggression factor which husbandsfound a physical loaded all violentitems, and another aggression. factor for psychological The third factorconsists of one of the according to Straus' reasoning items acid"Cried" (which, scoring method, isnot scored on consists of the remaining any CTS scale); and thefourth factor two reasoning items. It is possible that done the factor analysiswithout the "cried" if Barling et al.had item the thirdfactor would consist reasoning items. Theresults of factoring of the data provided by thewives ware similar, Schuman et al, (1982) administered Form N to 181adolesnents and found The first factorconsisted of all physical three factors. violence items (including"threw or smashed something"), the secondfactor measured verbal item which loaded with aggression (minus the"stomped out of room" the first factor),and a third factor calmly" and "got included "discussed issue information to backup your side" into a verbal reasoningmeasure. Summary Of Factor Analyses. Eight factor analysis of these Gully studies have been carriedout. One et al. (1981) and Sack,Keller'and Howard Although there (1982) addressa different issue. are some differences in thefindings, the six comparable a factor structure which analyses all found approximates the threeoriginally postulated verbal aggressionand violence. tactics of reasoning, that differences thereare probably reflect the some studies used modificationsof the CTS. fact that

Concurrent Validity

Validity is themost important and the ascertain. most difficult aspect ofan instrument to In part this is becauseof some inherent is appropriate for difficulties in obtainingdata which measuring concurrentvalidity. degree to which the Concurrent validity isestimated by the new instrument is relatedto other presumably valid association cannot bedetermined if the instruments.This new measure is the onlymeasure of the phenomenon, or if (rightly or wrongly)other measures are thought to be inaccurateor invalid. Another difficulty in evaluating validity isthat, despite criteria for judging the a huge literature, the validity of an instrumentare far from precise. may seem, there are Remarkable as it no established standardsfor judging concurrent Inspection of several validity coefficients. psychometrics texts revealed nor does the Standards that almost none give For Educational and numerical figures, Psychological Tests andManuals published by American PsychologicalAssociation. the Perhaps the reason isthat the assessment of is a complex issuethat is best approached validity multidimensionally (see for and Kidder, 1982; example, Brindberg Campbell and Fisk,1959). Nevertheless, some numerical frame of reference can be helpful.Cronbach (1970) is Table 5.3 "Illustrative one of the few authors whoprovides this. Validity Coefficients" His tests and sub-tests. includes 18 coefficientsfor widely used My tabulation ofthese coefficients shows Cronbach comments "Itis unusual for that the mean is .37. a validity coefficientto rise above 0.60...." Standards for judging concurrent validityare even more elusive in sociological research sociology because reports rarely includeany validity evidence Straus and Brown, 1978). at all (Straus, 1964; Sociologists place greatimportance on the the sample,and seem to implicitly representativeness of assume that if the sample is representative, the measures used in studying thatsample are valid.*10 These problems shouldbe kept in mind in evaluating theconcurrent validity of the CTS.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 23 Before turning to the formal evidence (in the form of validitycoefficients) an elementary but basic point needsto be established: aresubjects willing toreport instances in which they verbally and physically assaulted other membersof their family? At the time the Family Violence Research Program began, itwa.:. :idely believed that this information, if obtainable at all, could only be gotten though in-depthinterviews based on carefully establishing rapport with the respondent. Contrary to this belief, the CTS, whether administered in the form of a questionnaire, by face-to-factinterview, or by phone interview, has proven to be successful in obtaining high rates ofoccurrence for socially undesirable acts of verbal and physical aggression. These highrates are consistent with previous in-depth interview studies such as Gelles (1974) andmuch higher than the rates from any other currently availabletechnique (see Chapter 5) .*11

Another bit of evidence confirming the ability of the CTS to obtaindata on violence is the consistency of the National Survey Rates with the rate obtainedby the Randomized Response Technique described earlier and which is widely assumedto be able to elicit more complete reporting of deviant behavior. Zdep and Rhodes (1976) used thistechnique, which guarantees the anonymity of the respondent, to estimate the incidence of childabuse. Their estimate of 15% is almost identical to the rate obtainedby the National Family Violence Survey using the CTS.

Concurrent Validity Evidence As Reported in Straus (1979). The first studyreporting concurrent validity for the CTS was Bulcroft and Straus (1975).The CTS was completed by students in two sociology courses. The students responded fora referent period consisting of the last year they lived at home while in high school.l Theywere asked to indicate, to the best of their knowledge, how often during thatyear their father and mother had done each of the items in the CTS.

Each student was also asked to fill in a separate form with thenames and addresses of their parents so that a similar questionnaire could besent to them. voluntary and students Participation was were assured that they would not bementioned in the letter to the parents, and that as soon as the mailing was completed the names and addresses wouldbe destroyed and all documents identified by a number only from thenon. Of the 110 students present in these classes, 105 completed the questionnaire. Of the 168 questionnaires to the mothers and fathers (each sent was sent separately with itsown return envelope) 121 or 72 percent returned the questionnaire. A comparison of parent reports withstudent reports in this study, and also with student reports froma previous study (Straus, 1974a), is given in Table 3.

(Table 3 about here)

The correlations shown in Table 3 are difficult to interpret. First, the pattern is varied. The correlations are low for the Reasoning scale and high (relativeto typical concurrent validity results for most social psychological tests and scales) for theVerbal Aggression and Violence scales. An analysis by Bulcroft and Straus(1975) suggests that the higher correlations for the two aggressive modes of conflictare due to such acts being more dramatic and emotionally charged and, therefore,better remembered.

(Table 4 about here)

Another way of examining the concurrent validity of the CTS isto compare incidence rates for violence as reported by each spouse, and also as reported by students fortheir parents. The rates are shown in Table 4. For the Bulcroft and Straus (1975)study, the first two rows of the table show a tendency for the students toreport somewhat more violence by husbands than the husbands themselves reported, but toreport less violence by wives than the wives themselves reported. One does not know which data (thestudent report or the reports of the spouses themselves) is more accurate since each has itsown potential source of bias. The last two rows of Table 4,however, suggest that these discrepancies

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 24 might be the result ofthe small size or other characteristics of the sampleused in that study, since the resultsobtained by student report for the larger samplein the Straus. (1974a) study (thirdrow) are almost identical with the violencerates reported by the nationally representativesample of spouses shown in the last row of Table4.

Other Studies ofAgreement Between Family Members.*12 other studies have been Since Chapter 3was written, published which give thedegree to which the agree. One of these (Jouriles and reports of each spouse O'Leary, 1985) presents thefindings as a measure of "interspousal reliability." This usage seems to implicitly violence measure. assume the validity of the CTS Alternatively, such datacan be regarded as a means of extent of concurrent validity. determining the The importance of viewingcouple agreement validity is stressed by Edleson as a measure of and Brygger (1986) andSzinovacz (1983).

Edelson and Brygger (19.861note that if the CTS is used tool in a treatment as a diagnostic and evaluation program for assaultive men "relianceon men's self-reports, if accurate, may lead to inappropriate not treatment decisions and have safety of victims grave impl. _ions for the [and]...overestimate...the success of a treatmentprogram" (page 377). Consequently, they tested thehypothesis that the 29 barterers in their samplewill report less violence and lesssevere violence than their female paitners. They found higher rates of reporting bywomen on all 13 violent acts in their version of the CTS, includingfour which were statisticallysignificant. In a six month follow up administration ofthe CTS, violence had greatly decreasedand the gender difference in reporting wasno longer present except for the "pushed, gabbed,shoved.." item.

Jouriles and O'Leary (1985. compared the responsesto the violence items and the violence index for 65 couples beginning marital therapyand for a "community sample" couples. In the therapy sample, they of 37 found 72% agreement betweenthe reports of the two spouses for violence by the husbandand the same percentage wife. agreement for violence by the For the community samplethe percentage agreement husband and 80% for violence was 77% for violence by the by the wife. However,these high agreement reflect consensus scores largely on the nonoccurrence of violence inan extreme]: Consequently, they also reported ,zewed distribution. a better measure of agreement-- The coefficients for husband's kappa coefficient. violence were .43 for thetherapy s.ple and .40 for the community sample; and forwife's violence,.40 for the therapy sample community sample. and .41 for the

Szinovacz (1983) analysis of data from 103 couples isthe most detailed and thorough analysis of agreement between spouses in response to the CTS.At the aggregate level, Szinovacz like other investigators, found almost identicalviolence index rates regardless of whose responseswere considered. However, when comparing thereport of one spouse with the report of the otherspouse, she found that only 40% the wife, and 27% agreement agreement for use of violence by on the use of violence by the husband. The lack of agreement on the wife's violence was mainly due to "a considerable number ofwomen [who] report at least one incidence of violenceagainst the husband that is spouse" (page 638). not acknowledged by their Szinovacz also found that whenthe violence index is based reported by either on events spouse, the rate is about 50% higherthan rates based only one spouse. on the report of

Browning and Dutton (1986)compared responses to Form husband was undergoing N for 30 couples where the treatment for wife assault. Themean violence index for the husbands was 9.3 as reported by the husband, but almost twiceas high (17.3) as reported by the wives. The mean index score for violence by wiveswas 6.7 as reported by the husbands, only 3.9 as reported by but the wives. Each partner thereforetended to own violence. under report their The correlation betweenspouses for husband's violence for violence by the wife. was .65, but only .26

Winkler & Doherty

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 25

b Summary of Agreement Studies. The studies reviewedare consistent in finding large discrepancies between the reports of husbands and wives. These often take the form of under- reporting by the perpetrator. It is therefore importantto obtain data from both spouses, particularly if CTS scores are used for treatment decisions orprogram evaluation. When the CTS is used for basic research, where the issue isnot the absolute level of violence, but the relationship between variables, thesimilarityin overall aggregate) the rates based (i.e. on male and female subjects, together withthe similarity in findings regardless of gender of respondent (see Chapter 9) makesdata from both spouses less crucial.

Bring in differential reportingfor minor and severe violence

Gender of Respondent and RelationshipsBetween Variables (Section to be completed)

Relationships between variables are parallel when aggregate dataare used, regardless of who is the respondent. Szinovacz Figure 1 shows this,and also shows that regardless of how the couple data are used, the results are essentiallyparallel.

Difference between single person and source of data andas object of study

Discrepancy as a meaningful variable

Social Desirability ResponseSet As A Threat To Validity

Since the first paper describing the CTS, the fact thatnot every respondent will be willing to describe instances in which he or She kickedor punched a child or a spouse has been emphasized. This has typically been followed by statements that thetrue rate is probably much higher than the measured rate (Straus, Gelles, andSteinmetz, 1980: ??). The degree to which the true rates are greater than the rate obtained by usingthe CTS is not known. Consequently, the best that can be said about the accuracy of the CTSis that it probably closer to the true incidence rate than other methodsbecause it producesa higher incidence rate than any other method.

For research on family violence (as compared to clinical use),a more serious problem than underestimating theamount of violence isthe possibility thatthedegree of underestimate varies from subject to subject and that thisis correlated with other characteristics of the subject. This problem, which is referredto as "correlated error" rather than random error, can produce erroneous findings. For example, the correlation between having been the victim of violence by a spouse and depression(Gelles and Straus, 1987) might be spurious if both reflect person-to-person differences in willingnessto tell aninterviewer about such socially stigmatized behavior. Thispossibility has been investigated using measures of "socialdesirability response set."

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 26

29 Arias and Beach (1987)used the Marlowe-Crown Social Desirability Scale witha 'sample of 90 couples and foundcorrelations with the CTS violence index of -.23 forviolence by husbands and -.32 for violenceby wives. Both correlations arestatistically significant, but in the light of thestigmatizing behavior measured by the CTS violenceindex are much lower than might beexpected. In addition, among subjects who reportedengaging in violence, socialdesirability was not related of the violence; to their reports of frequencyand/or severity and no relationship was foundbetween reports of being tendency to respond in a victim and a socially desirable manner. The most important controlling for social finding was that desirability did not eliminatethe relationship between other demographic, personality, the CTS and and marital relationshipsvariables.

Saunders (1986) administered the Marlowe-Crown SD scale

Saunders and Hanusa (1986)

Gender Similarity As Evidence Of Validity For ResearchPurposes

Summary of Concurrent Validity.

Construct Validity

Construct validity refersto the association between the variables. measure in question and other The extent that theseassociations are consistent with theoreticalor empirical knowledge is used to evaluateconstruct validity (Cronbach, 1964). 1970; Nunnally, 1978;Straus, Thus, a measure of thecaloric intake should be based on the theory that correlated with feelinghungry, the subjective experienceof hunger is caused by intake. Of course, the correlation lack of food will be less than 1.00because there are other factors which also influencesubjective feelings of hunger.

There is even more ambiguityas to the size of the coefficient evidence of construct validity which will be takenas than there is forconcurrent validity. the process. If the theory being This is inherent in tested with the newmeasure specifies a close linkage between the independent anddependent variable, then a large correlation is needed; butif (as in most theories)only a weak bivariate relation is posited because of thenumerous other factors whichare involved, then low correlations, provided they are statistically significant, support the construct validity of themeasures used to test the theory.

It follows from the abovethat the construct validity of the CTS can be assessedby the degree to which theCTS measures produce findings which are consistent withtheoretical or empirical propositions aboutthe variable which the Chapter 3 gives a instrument purports tomeasure. summary of the concurrent validityevidence which was available years ago, Since then, a large number even ten of studies using the CTShave been published which provide much more evidence. In fact, the number isso great that not all can be mentioned, and even those only briefly.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 27

.3 0 * The CTS data on the extent to which patterns of violence are correlated from one generation to the next, firstreported by (1977a,b) and by Straus (1983, Straus et al., 1980 )is consistent with many other empirical findings and social learning theory and has also beenconfirmed by many other investigators (see meta analysis by Hotalingand Sugarman, 1986).

* Use of the CTS in the two National Family Violence Surveys have confirmed the existence of many hypothesized "risk factors" for family violence (Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, 1980), including:

Inequality between spouses, and especiallymale-dominance Poverty Unemployment Stress Youthfulness Heavy drinking Lack of community tie

* Comparisons of women who experienced relatively minor violence andwomen who experienced severe violence in 1985 withwomen who had not been attacked by their husbands (Gelles and Straus, 1987, 1988)show that:

Seriously assaulted women averaged almost double the days in bed dueto illness than did other women. A third fewer severely assaulted wives reportedbeing in excellent health, and three times as many reported being in poor health. Seriously assaulted women had much higherrates of psychological distress, including:

- Double the incidence of headaches - Four times the rate of feeling depressed - Five and a half times more suicideattempts

* Gelles and Straus (1987, 1988) alsocompared children who had been severely assaulted by a parent with the other children in the sample and found thatthe abused children consistently experiencedmore behavior problems. For example, the child victims of severe violence had2 to 4 times higher rates of:

Trouble making friends Temper tantrums Failing grades in school DisciplLary problems in school andat home Physically assaultive behavior at home andelsewhere Vandalism and theft Drinking and drug use Arrests

Relationships such as the above, andmany others indicative of the construct validity of the CTS violence scores have been found by a number of investigators, forexample:

* The less affection between theparents of a respondent,the higher the incidence of violence against a martialpartner (Szinovacz, 1983).

* Violent couples identified with theCTS, compared to non-violent couples matched on Marlowe-Crown Social DesirabilityScale, are characterized by asymmetry in power, high conflict, lackor organization, and low sharing of pleasurable activities (Resick and Reese, 1986)

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 28

31 * Physically abusive men identified by the CTS havelower self-esteem (Neidigy Friedman, and Collins, 1986)

* Theoreticalpropositions tested using CTS data tend to holdregardless of the gender of the respondent(see Chapter 9)

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

Every instrument has itslimitations and the CTS is no exception. Thischapter alerts readers to as many of thepossible limitations identify. as I or critics of the CTS havebeen able to In some cases theconcerns are groundless or erroneous, in othercases they point to possible butnot empirically demonstrated problems, and in still othercases they are problems and limitationswhich are inherent in the instrumentas it is currently structured must thereforebe kept in mind when CTS data. interpreting the results ofresearch using

The deficiencies of the CTS are most seriousas a measure of physical abuse children, and severalsuggestions for revision of were presented. Although revisions of the CTS for use in measuringspouse abuse are also possible, one must weigh the potential against the loss ofcomparability with previous gains studies using the CTSas it now stands, and the loss of abilityto use the comprehensive normative tables in Appendix2. The chapter also reviews the evidenceon factor structure, reliability The factor structure is and validity. remarkably consistentacrossstudies using widely populations and conducted varying by different investigators. reliability, is at best The internal consistency moderate, mainlyas a result of the small number scale which was necessitated of items in each by the decisionto make the CTS a brief suitable forsurvey research. instrument which is The concurrent validity,as measured by agreement between spouses or between parents andchildren is more difficult established standards for to evaluate because thereare no validity coefficients. However, the coefficients range of validity coefficients are within the typically reported. The strongest evidence construct validity of the CTS. concerns the It has been used ina large number of studies have findings which tendto be consistent with produced previous research whenthat is available, consistent regardless otgender of respondent, and theoretically meaningful.

Ironically, the weakestaspect of the CTS are the scales criticism: the Reasoning which have received theleast and the Verbal Aggression.The number of items reasoning scale is clearly used to measure inadequate and neither scalehas been used sufficiently able to reachconclusions about validity. to be The low usage of thereasoning and verbal aggression scales reflectsthe fact that the major attraction ofthe CTS has been the measure of physical violence. However, on both theoretical and methodological grounds,it is almost certain thatmore will be learned about violence of other tactics if it is studied in thecontext for resolving conflicts,as was done by Straus (1974) (1978).*13 and Steinmetz

Although far froma perfect instrument, the comparison presented in thischapter of the CTS with theavailable alternatives, together with the evidenceon stable factor structure, moderatereliability and concurrent validity,and the strong evidence construct validity, all of suggest that the CTS is thebest available instrument intra-family violence. to measure

ENDNOTES

1. See Gelles andStraus (1979) for a detailed theoretical analysis of thisdefinition and an analysis ofalternative definitions. As pointed out in that article,the fact of a

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 29 32 physical assault having taken place is not sufficient for understandingviolence. Several other dimensions also neededto be considered. However, it is also important thateach of these other dimensions be measured separately so that theircauses and consequences and joint effects can be investigated. Among the other dimensionsare the seriousness of the assault (which can range from a slap to stabbing and shooting); whethera physical injury was produced (which can range from none to death); the motivation (which mightrange from a concern for a person's safety, as when a child is spanked for going into thestreet, to hostility so intense that the death of the person is desired); and whetherthe act of violence is normatively legitimate (as in the case of slapping a child)or illegitimate (as in the case of slapping a spouse), and which set of norms are applicable(legal, ethnic or class norms, couple norms, etc.).

2. It is ironic that the main criticism of the CTS has come from feminists. There are actually three ironies. First,I consider myself a feminist, andpublished the first empirical research showing the relation of male dominance to violence(Straus, 1973). A year earlier I presented a paper on "SexualInequality, Cultural Norms, and Wife-Beating" (Straus, 1976). That paper was widely distributed by women's groups until I becamepersona non grata for publishing data on violence bywomen. The second irony is that the CIS has provided, and continues to provide, the most powerful "hard data" on the extent ofwife- beating. This data has been used in countless communities to help build thecase for shelters and other services needed by battered women, and has also figuredin state and national legislative hearings. Third, the two most specific feministcriticisms of the CTS (not indicating who originates the violence and the extent to whichwomen are physically injured) turn out to be "defects" which strengthen the case for women because itturns out that womm initiate as often as men and because the injury rate is actuallyvery low. See the section's on initiation and injurylater in this chapter.

3. This is an appropriate place to clear up a misunderstanding about whomay use the CTS. Although the article which serves as a manual for the CTS (Straus, 1979) iscopyright, the instrument itself is not. Anyone may thereforeuse the CTS in its original form or modify it without permission of either the author or the journal in which itwas published. However, I would appreciate copies ofany reports using the CTS so that the bibliography can be updated for the benefit of other scholars.

4. For convenience and economy of wording the terms spouse, partner, husband,wife, couple, marital, etc are used to refer to couples,irrespective of whether theyare a married ora non-married cohabiting couple. For an analysisof differencesand similarities between married and cohabiting couples see Stets and Straus, 1987; Yllo1978; Yllo and Straus, 1981.

5. By "incompatible" I am referring to what is possiblewithin the score of a particular instrument.However, within the scope ofa research project more than one approach can be, and where possible, shouldbe used. Within the scope of a field or research issue, it is essential that thistype of triangulation occur because each approach brings into focus aspects of a phenomenon which are hidden to other approaches. This perspective is the opposite of that taken byextreme partisans of a particular method who stateorimply that only their methodcan provide an adequate understanding of the phenomenon.

6. These conclusions hold regardless of whether the information is obtainedfrom the victim or the offender or from a male respondent or a female respondent.At the same time, victims do report more injuries than offenders, and this is most pronounced forfemale victims. But it does not change the point made inthis section: that measuring family violence on the basis of injuries vastly understates the problem, not froma medical perspective, but from the perspective ofa civil society. Thus,according to female victims of male violence, the injuryrate is 7.3%, whereas according to male perpetrators of severe assaults, the injury rate is 2.3%,i.e., the rate as reported by women victims is threetimes greater. Nevertheless,this same statistics means that 92.7% ofsevere

VB6.P,VB166,9December87, Page 30 33 assaults would not beincluded in the statistics if the injury rateas reported by' women victims of severe violencewere used as the measure of minor assaults on spouse abuse, and 98.4percent of, women would not be counted ifinjury were the criteria. 7. Those interested in using the CTS intheir own research should Appendix 2, and particularly also consult the section on the differencesbetween rates and scales.

8. It should berecognized that in most instances, the outcomefrom being kicked, although painful, doesnot result in an injury. less of an abusive act. However, absence of injurydoes not make it Our distinction betweenminor and severe violence legal distinction between parallels the a "simple assault" andan "aggravated assault" -.ssault is an attack which An aggravated is likely to causegrave bodily harm, such knife or gun, irrespective as an attack with a of whether the objectof the attack was actually the discussion of injury injured. See as a criterion of abuse previoussection. 9. That is correct from a clinical perspective because the which are known and only real casesare those treated. However, from an epidemiological perspective, the former isa measure of interventions ratherthan of incidence. There is some evidencethat the Child Protective Services rate, whichhave been increasing at a rate of about 10%per year, has a negative correlation withthe child abuse rate as measured by the CTS(see Straus and Gelles, 1986 for a discussionof the possible reasons).

10. The situation is almost the opposite inpsychology. psychologists pay much Relative to sociologists, more attention to the validityof the measures and implicitly assume that if seem to the measure is valid, thesample is not crucial.

11. Although the majorresponse distortion may be sometimes occur. under-reporting, exaggerationmay Some victims mayexaggerate to gain sympathy for their plight, andsome macho type malesmay exaggerate to show that they "know how to handlea woman." 12. In reviewing these studies,the focus will be on the violence indexscores as computed from theresponses of husbands and wives, not on differences betweenspouses in respect to the individualitems which are combined to create the index. This was done because the space topresent results at the item level this paper and, is not justifiable in thecontext of more importantly, because thekey question is the validity scores or indexes, not the of the composite separate items makingup the instrument. validity of separate items The reliability and is always lower thanthat of the overall course is the reason for using instrument, which of multi-item tests rather thansingle items. 13. To take this suggestion seriously, one needs to go beyond the CTS and alsouse an instrument which measuresa broader range of non-punitive than can be accomplished methods of resolvingconflicts with even an expandedset of reasoning items.

VB6.P,VB106,9December87, Page 31 3 ei Preliminary Incomplete

Appendix 2 (1,44A-

NEW SCORING METHODS FOR VIOLENCE AND NEW NORMS FOR THECONFLICT TACTICS SCALES

Murray A. Straus Family Research Laboratory,University of New Hampshire Durham, NH03824 (603) 862-2594

Contents

FORMS A, N, AND R 2 TERMINOLOGY Indexes 3 Scalps Versus Rates 3 Types of Scales 3 3 NEW VIOLENCE MEASURES Rates 3 4 Minor And Severe Violence Scales and Rates 4 Severity Weighted Scales Guttman Scales 6 Highest of Either 6 Ever Rates And Scales 7 Violence Types 7 7 Which Violence Measure? 9 RECODING RESPONDENT-SPOUSE ITEMS INTO HUSBAND-WIFE FORMAT 10 NORMS 10 New Normative Sample 11 Improved Method Of Presentation 11 New Violence Indexes and Typologies 11 Gender and Age-Specific Norms 11

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 1

35 In the ten years between the writing of Chapter 3 and thewriting of this Appendix, great deal has been learned about a the psychometric characteristicsof the Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) and about the limitations of the original methodsof scoring the violence items of the CTS.In response to these limitations, alternative methods of using violence items to create the measure of intra-family violencewere developed. The first part of this appendix describes the different versions of the CTS nd gives the rational for these new measures and also scoringinstructions.

Within that same timespan, a second and much larger nationally of families was tested. This representative sample new data makes possible morecurrent and more reliable norms. The last section of this appendix therefore providesnew normative data, and also this data in a form which is presents better fits the needs of bothresearchers and clinicians.

FORMS A, N, AND R

The three versions of the CTS, forms S, N, and R,are fundamentally the same, but differ in respect to the number of items for each scaleand the response categories presented to the subjects. FormA was administered as a written questionnaire, Form Nas an in-person interview, and form N as part of a telephoneinterview. However, any of these forms can be administeredas a questionnaire, in-person, or by telephone. Table 1 summarizes the differences betweenthe thee versions:

(Table 1 about here)

Form A. The first version of the CTS was administeredin questionnaire format college student subjects. to The subjects were asked torespond by indicating what happened in their family of orientation during the last year theylived at home when they high school. In most were in cases this was when they were seniorsin high school (Straus, 1973, 1974). This version of the CTS was also used for thevalidity study in which the of students concerning the responses conflict tactics used by theirparents and the response of the parents themselves were compared. The results are summarizedin Chapter 3 and presented in detail in Bulcroft and Straus(1975).

Form N. Form N was developed for use in the 1975-76 NationalFamily Violence Survey, as reported in the book Behind Closed Doors: Violence In the AmericanFamily (Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, 1980)and in many of the chapters Form A in having additional in this book. Form N differsfrom violence items and fewer reasoningitems, and the response categories were expanded (seeTable 1).

Form R. Form R is the version used in the 1985 National FamilyViolence Resurvey, reported in the book Intimate as Violence (Gelles and Straus,1988) in several chapters this book, and in the panel in study based on reinterviews ofa sub-sample in 1986 and 1987. The difference between form N and R is that form R hasan additional parent-child item "Burned or scalded him/her" inserted after "Beat him/her up,"and an additionalspouse item "Choked him/her /you" inserted after "Beat him/her /you up." In addition, with Form R the interviewer read theresponse categories, starting with "once" 20 times." and continuing to "more than Using this format, respondentsmust volunteer "never" or "don't know." change was made because it tends This to increase the rate of reportingsensitive or deviant behavior (see for example,Kinsey, Pomeroy, and Martin, 1948).

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 2 36 TERMINOLOGY

The three basic summative scales (for Reasoning, VerbalAggression, and Violence) described in Chapter 3. are This appendix focuses.on theadditional ways to including more sophisticated measure violence, summative scales, rates,and typologies. Before describing each of these, the terminologyto be used needs to be defined.

Indexes

For purposes of this book, theterm "index" is a general term which to a variable created by combining is used to refer two or more of the "items"("indicators") in the CTS. The index can be in theform of a summative scale, a Guttman Scale, a rate, ora typology. There are summative scaleindexes to measure Reasoning, Aggression or Violence. Verbal Aggression, and Physical In addition, for violence,there are several summative rates, and typologies. scales,

Scales Versus Rates

The violence indexes can be expressed as either scalesor rates. between the CTS violence The difference scales and CTS violence ratesis that the scales variables and the rates are continuous are binary variables, usually coded 0versus 1. using the scale version of the Thus an ANOVA Husband-to-Wife Violence index willgive the mean number of assaults which occurredduring the year. If the same ANOVA is version of the Husband-to-Wife repeated with the rate Violence index, the resultswill show the proportion of couples (which can be converted to a rate per 100 couplesor per 1,000 couples by moving the decimal) who reported one or more violent incidents during theyear.

Types of Scales

Several different methods have been used to compute violenceindex scales, including scales weighted by the frequency of occurrence of each violentact in the index, scales weighted by the product of the frequency times a weight for theseverity (injury producing potential) of each violentact, and Guttman scales.

The original CTS indexes described in Chapter 3are frequency weighted scales because each consists of thesum of the number of times each act occurred. Thus, ifa respondent indicated that pushingor shoving occurred once, throwing things occurred four times,and slapping occurred once, the scale on Overall Violence Index scale would besix.

Violence Types

Several different typologieshave been developed to classify severity of the violence, and families according to the according to which member of thecouple engaged in assaults against the other.

NEW VIOLENCE MEASURES

Chapter 3 provides the conceptual and theoretical rational forthe Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) and informationon how to score the items dealing with obtain an "Overall Violence physical violence to Index." It also suggests,but does not detail methods of creating what we havecome to call "Severe Violence" indexes which can be used tomeasure the occurrence of child abuseand wife-beating.

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 3 Most of the analyses in this book and most researchby others using the of the OverallViolence and Severe Violence CTS makes use indexes, either in the formof a frequency. weighted scale,or (more usually) in the form of a rate (see abovefor the difference between a scale anda rate as used in this chapter). However,as noted in chapter 4, reliance on thesetwo indexes has certain drawbacks. They donot fully reflect the differences in severity ofviolence inherent in the hierarchical structure ofthe violent acts. Moreover, the somewhatarbitrary distinction can, under some circumstances, between "minor" and"severe" violence distort the data. In addition, measuring behavior ofone person in the family, without the assaultive those assaults taking into account whetherthe victim of was also violent, may also bemisleading. For these additional methods of and other reasons, scoring the CTS violenceitems were developed, measures may be more appropriate These additional for certain purposes. This and scoring method for several section describes therationale of these alternativeviolence measures and statistics for eachmeasure. gives descriptive

Rates

An annual incidencerate has the advantages of unambiguous meaning andease of understanding by the generalpublic. In addition, since incidence used in criminology and rates are so frequently epidemiology, expressing familyviolence as incidence comparisons with other related rates permits phenomena. For this reason almost Straus, Gelles, and Steinmetz all the statistics in (1980) are in the formof rates.

There are also certainstatistical advantages is because the distribution to using rates rather thanscales. This of the violencescores is extremely skewed (85 percent at best for spouses). versus 16 This causes problems when variable. violence is usedas the dependent The skewed distributionproblem becomes of a score which even worse if the measure isin the form indicates how much violenceoccurs, i.e. distribution is further if the violent 15`k ofthe extended by weightingthose cases according violence occurred.. to how 'often the Regression parameterscan be seriously distorted by distribution. such a skewed Ironically, the situationis improved slightly if into a rate by dichotomizing the score is transformed into 1 any violence of the type measured husband-wife, minor, (e.g. parent-child, severe, etc.) versus 0 no violence.

Although rates are better than scales formost analyses using the indexes, because (as explained CTS violence above) it does not exacerbatethe skewness problem, because rates area statistic that more people and also where the scores can understand, thereare circumstances are preferable. One situation in which needed is when the scale scores rather thanrates are analysis focuseson a group, all of whom violent, and the issue is are known to be or have been not whether there is violence,but how much. research on "clinical" This will occur in groups, such as the husbands ofwomen in a shelter, or treatment program. The how much issue is person in a also relevant to analysesof violent groups identified by the CTS itself,as illustrated in the latter issue is how often do part of Chapter 7, where the abusing parents assaultthe child.

To transform a violenceindex scale into a rate, it is only necessaryto dichotomize the violence itemsor any of the violence indexes as 0 versus 1. Users of SPSS can do this with the recode command,for example to recode through r): MODE the eight CTS violenceitems (items k Q78K TO Q78R (1 thru 6 1)

Minor And Severe ViolenceScales and Rates

It is often importantto distinguish between assaults which are "minor" (in thesense that they are lessdangerous and less the focus of moral condemnation)and "severe"

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 4

38 violence, which are acts that have a greater likelihoodof causing an injury, make up what the public and which thinks of as "child abuse"and "wife-beating".

Severe Violence. The severe violence scalesare computed by summing items in Form N, and N though N through R 3 in form R. If the items are first to the midpoints of the recoded from the 0 to 6format approximate frequency designatedby each response 2, 4, 8, 15, and 25) category (0, 1, the resulting scalescores will be a measure of the which oce :red. number of assaults The following SPSS commandscan be used to create the Severe Scale: Violence

COMPUTE SEVERV - ITEMN + ITEMO+ ITEM + ITEMQ + ITEM + ITEMS

The rate version of thisindex (see above for the way in which the term rate isused here), can be created withthe following SPSS commands:

COMPUTE SEVEREVR - SEVEREV RECODE SEVEREVR(1 THRU HI- 1)

Very Severe Violence. When the CTS is used to measure physical abuse ofchildren older than infants, thereis widespread reluctance to including hittinga child with an object (such asa hair brush or belt) as necessarily abusive. To meet this criticism, developed a measure of we physical abuse for children,the Very Severe Violence omit:; item 0 (hit with index, which something) and is thereforerestricted to items N, P, Q, all of which are almost R, and S, universally acceptedas "abusive" acts. This measure and the rational behind it are described inmore detail in Chapter ???. Minor Violence. For some purposes itmay also be desirable to have of "minor violence" which separate measure measures how often assaults of thistype occurred (see for example, chapters 7, 9, 10,13, 19, 21). Since the minor violence acts are items K,L, and M, the following SPSS commandscan be used to compute this scale:

COMPUTE MINORV - ITEM + ITEML ITEM

The rate version of thisindex (see above for the way in which the term rate isused here), can be created withthe following SPSS commands:

COMPUTE MINORVR - MINORV RECODE MINORVR (1 THRU HI- 1)

A difficulty with thismeasure of minor violence is that, committed severe assaults also since most persons who have engaged in minor violence,this measure mixes people have committed only minor who violence with those who havealso severely assaulted. glance one might think that At first this problem can be avoidedby a "conditional i.e. one which computes the transformation), minor violence index onlyif the scale on the index is zero. severe violence However, this is not satisfactorybecause it does not deal with where there was both the cases severe and minor violehce. If they are scored violence, this is misleading as zero on minor in the extreme. If they are assigned the code, then these critically "missing value" important cases are lost from theanalysis. create a typology or nominal One solution is to variable to identify the "level"of violence, as explained below in the sectionon violence types

Wife-Beating.

VB6X P ,VB106, 9December87 , Page 5

JJ Severity Weighted Scales

The Overall Violence Index, the Severe ViolenceIndex, and the Minor reflect differencesin how often (1) Violence Index any acts of violence, (2)severe acts of violence, (3) acts of minorviolence occurred. or One then has to choosebetween these three If it is desirableto taxe into account different indexes. degrees of severity of violenceas well as the frequency of violence,two sets of statistics less cumbersome method must be computed andpresented. A of taking intoaccount both the severity violence is possible and the frequency of with a "Severity WeightedScale." each violent This multiplies thefrequency of act in Form N by the followingweights (chosen with colleagues on the basis of consultation concerning the injuryproducing potential of each (the minor violence act): Items K, L, andM acts) are unweighted,i.e. they have a weight other items are: kick, of 1. The weights forthe bit, punch 2; hit with object scalded 5, 3; beat up, chocked,burned, threatened witha knife or gun 6, used knife categories for must first or gun 8. The res'onse be recoded from thecodes of 1 through 6 (Form (Form R) to the approximate N) or 0 through S midpoints of these categories: 0, 1, 2, 4, 8, 15,and 25. Although the Severity Weighted Scale resultsin a continuous variable, problems with it has the same extreme skewness as the otherviolence scales. The actually be worsenedbecause the severity skewness problemmay weighting createseven more extreme outliers than occur when only the itemsare weighted only by their as with the frequency frequency ofoccurrence. Consequently, weighted scales, the severity weighted indexshould not be used with statistical techniques(such as ordinary least square regression) whichassume at least a moderately normaldistribution. Instead, the scores can be used to dividethe sample into nominal categories,or non-parametric regression techniques suchas TOBIT can be used. Wife-Beating. The problem ofterminology and norms is between spouses than even greater for violence for violence byparents. Although occasionally usually considered abuse slapping a child isnot (or even "violence"),the same act is typically violet if doneto a spouse. considered to be Thus, since any assaulton a spouse tends to be considered abusive, in thecase as of violence betweenspouses, the important. "overall violence"index is This is in contrastto the situation for noted in Chapter 4) the parent-to-child violence,where (as overall violence indexis not a meaningful acts of minor violence measure because it the which are includedin the overall violence considered to be abuse. index are rarely

Although I consider any hitting of aspouse, including "only" slapping something at wife,to be abusive, such or -'sowing acts of minor violence are not "wife bea,Ing" the public undarstandsthat term. as For the public atlarge, wife-beating assaults and probablyalso repeated means severe severe assaults. Violence ofless severityor less frequency may be consideredabusive, but the public beating." does not think ofit as "wife- Consequently, if thepurpose at hand requires public conception of a measure which approximatesthe wife-beating, the SevereViolence index should be to measure the level of used. If one wants violence which approximatesthe level which tends women who seek refuge in to prevail among a "safe house" for batteredwomen, then it is also require that such actshave occurred repeatedly, necessary to past year. for example, fouror more times during the

Guttman Scales

The CTS itemswere selected and arranged in what was believedto be a hierarchical ordering. The mainreason for this sequence was to increase the willingnessof respondents to report acts of violence. The hierarchical sequence reduces the refusalrate because it takes into account thecovert norms regarding the These norms justify violence use of physical violence in thefamily. if the parentor spouse has "tried everything" pleaded, -- reasoned, gotten help,gotten angry -- and, despite this, the conflict is stillnot resolved. For this reason,the violence items were selected and arrangedin order or

VB6X.P,V8106,9Decesber87, Page 6

4 U increasing severity. This sequence is also what is requiredto make it possible to Guttman scales for violence. compute

To the extent that the itemsform a perfect hierarchy, Guttman scale versions ofthe violence indexes have theadvantage of producing scales of severity of the which indicate the specificdegree violence used. For example,a score of three means that the used the three least respondent severe acts but not any of thefive more severe acts of included in the CTS. violence By contrast, an OverallViolence Index score of three engaging in any one of the can result from violent acts three times,from any three of them Guttman scales avoid this once, etc. problem, but It the priceof having to dichotomize i.e., of ignoring how often each item, each act of violenceoccurred.

When computing the Guttman scales for violence, the"division point" for all 0 versus 1 ormore occurrences of the act. items is However, since the marginalsare so skewed for the most extreme items(beating up, threatening with a knife or gun, usinga knife or gun), these items must becombined. This produces a compositeitem in which 0 is scored respondent did none of if the these, and 1 is scored ifany one or more of them SPSS this can be done were done. In using: COUNT q78PQR Q78P, Q78Q, Q78R (1).

> Sections still to be added:

Highest of Either

Szinovacz(1983) administered the CTS to both partnersand found that when the violence index is basedon events reported by either than the rate based spouse, the rate is about 50%higher on the report of only onespouse. This suggests that where both partners is available, data from the most completemeasurement will be obtained by response of the spouse who using the reports the most violenceon the grounds that the reporting less violence has spouse forgotten or is concealingviolent incidents.

Ever Rates And Scales

Rates. The CTS items inForms N and R are followed by asks whether that a question for each item which act had ever occurred. This supplemental question those who indicated that is asked only for the act did notoccur during the one year referent combining the main item and period. By the "ever" question,one can determine a prevalence the course of a marriage, rate over or since the birth ofa child. However, these rate must beused with considerable cautionbecause recall errors are almost certain to belarge. Scale. It is also possible to create a continuousscale, starting with 0 violence ever, 1 for no violence in the for no referent year of the studybut violence occurred at some point priorto that, and then scores of 2,3, 4 etc.for varying amounts of violence during the referentyear. However, as noted in theearlier section distribution of violence on rates, the is skewed so extremelythat it is probably best scale into a trichotomy to recode this by recoding 2 andover as 2, or recode into scale. a four category nominal

Violence Types

Violence Level. If,as will often be the case, the objective is to identify peoplewho used only minor violence,a typology rather than an index must be constructed. This is necessary because, as explainedabove most people who severely assault alsoengage in minor violence. One method isto create a three category typology: the non-violent,those who used only minor violence,and those who severely assaulted.* 1 This type of variable computed for child-to-child, can be parent-to-child, child-to-parent, husband violence.*2 husband-to-wife, and wife-to

VB6X.P,V8106,9December87, Page 7

41 Since the procedureto create these types is used to create them not entirely obvious, theSPSS commands. for the National FamilyViolence Resurvey three commands are given below. The first are to create the typewe labeled as "Husband Violence Level" and for which the SPSS variablename XC12L was used; the second three are for "WifeViolence Level" (XC15L), followed by"Couple Violence Level" (XC21L), and "ParentalViolence Level" (XC6L). In the case of theParent Violence Level, the Severe Violence categoryis divided into "Severe" and "Very Severe"(see ??? for an explanation).

IF (XC12W EQ 0) XC121rO IF (XC12N GE 1 AND XC12WSEQ 0) XCl2L-1 IF (012WS GE 1) XC12L-2 VARIABLE LABELS XC11L 'HUSBAND VIOLENCELEVEL'

IF (KC15W EQ 0) XC151p0 IF (015N GE 1 AND XC15WSEQ 0) XC15LF-1 IF (XC15WS GE 1) XC15LF-2 VARIABLE LABELS XC15L 'WIFE VIOLENCELEVEL' IF (XC21W EQ 0) XC21Lr0 IF (XC21N GE 1 AND XC21WSEQ 0) XC211-1 IF (XC21WS GE 1) XC21LF-2 VARIABLE LABELS XC21L'COUPLE VIOLENCE LEVEL'

IF (XC6W EQ 0) XC61?-0 IF (XC6N GE I AND XC6WS EQ0 AND XC6AB EQ 0) XC6Im1 IF (XC6WS GE 1 AND XC6ABEQ 0) XC6LP-2 IF (XC6AB GE 1) XC6Le3 VARIABLE LABELS XC6L 'PARENT VIOLENCELEVEL'

RECODE XC12L to XC6L(SYSMIS--999) MISSING VALUES XC121 TOXC6L (-999)

Couple Violence Types. The label "Couple Violence"applied to the CTS scales, and types describedup to this point is somewhat rates, misleading. A more accurate label be Couple Violence Sumbecause these variables would are created by adding thescore for husband- to-wife violence to thescore for wife-to-husband violence. The misleadingaspect occurs because a score of 6can occur when the husband has a score of 3 and the wifea score of 3, when the husband hasa score of 6 and the wife a score of zero, and when thehusband has a score of zero and the wifea score of 6. In the second and thirdof these possibilities, only one person isviolent, not both members of the coupleas implied by the term "couple violence." This is not to say that the couple violencesums are invalid measures. are valid when one wants to know They the total amount of violencewhich occurred, regardless who is the perpetratorand who is the victim. of other or both But when the issue is whetherone or the are violent, then the CoupleViolence Types (CPLV) needs to be used. described in this section The SPSS commands tocrate CPLV are:

When: XC12WR. Overall Violence Scalefor Husband-to-Wife violence XC15WR Overall Violence Scalefor Wife-to-Husband violence

IF (XCI2WR al 0 ANDXC15WR EQ 0) CPLV-0 IF (XC12WR EQ 0 AND XC15WREQ 1) CPLV-1 IF (XC12WR EQ 1 AND XC15WREQ 0) CPLV -2 IF (XCI2WR EQ 1 AND XC15WREQ 1) CPLV -3

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 8 42 VALUE LABELS CPLV 0 "NEITHERSPOUSE VIOLENT" 1 "WIFE ONLY VIOLENT" 2 "HUSBAND ONLY VIOLENT" 3 "HUSB AND WIFE VIOLENT"

The Couple Violence Leveltypes described above do not distinguish between minorand sever violence. Consequently, type 3 (both violent) does not identify coupleswhere one partner uses minor violence and theother engages in more severe assaults. aswas done in chapter ??. The typology used for the analysis in Chapter ??was done using a variable called "Couple Violence 2" (CPLV2), created with the followingSPSS commands.

IF (XC12L EQ 0 AND XC15L EQ 0)CPLV2-0 IF (XC12L EQ 1 AND XC15L EQ 0)CPLV2-1 IF (XC12L EQ 0 AND XC15L X 1)CPLV2-2 IF (XC12L EQ 1 AND XC15LEQ 1) CPLV2-3 IF (XC12L EQ 2 AND XC15L EQ 0)CPLV2-4 IF (XC12L EQ 0 AND XC15LEQ 2) CPLV2-5 IF (XC12L EQ 2 AND XC15L EQ 1)CPLV2-6 IF (XC12L EQ 1 AND XC15L EQ2) CPLV2-7 IF (XC12L EQ 2 AND XC15L EQ2) CPLV2-8

VARIABLE LABELS CPLV2 'COUPLE VIOLENCE TYPES 2' VALUE LABELS CPLV2 0 'NEITHERVIOLENT' 1 'H-MINOR, W-NONE' 2 'H-NONE, W-MINOR' 3 'BOTH MINOR' 4 'H-SEVERE, W-NONE' 5 'H-NONE, W-SEVERE' 6 'H-SEVERE, W-MINOR' 7 'H-MINOR, W-SEVERE' 8 'BOTH SEVERE'

Steinmetz Types.Suzanne Steinmetz (1977) developed a typology basedon a cross classification of the verbal and physical aggression indexes. This permits investigation of the interaction of thetwo conflict tactics.

Which Violence Measure?

This appendix adds several new methods of indexing violenceto the methods originally described. Which method to use depends mainly on the theoreticalpurpose and intended readership and-- because of the "robustness" of composite indexes (Straus and Kumagai, 1980) -- secondarilyon statistical criteria.

A Guttman scale would be the choice only if the hierarchyof acts is central to the issue being investigated (asin Straus, 1980). This is because Guttman scalesare, in other respects, typicallyless adequate instruments than ordinary linear additiveindexes (Straus and Kumagai, 1980). Moreover, since the Puttman scales all Guttman scales, have for violence, like almost less than perfect coefficients ofreproducibility, even the theoretical advantage of scores with a precisehierarchical meaning is attained. only partly

Scales. The Minor Violence scale is obviously appropriatein research which focuses the "ordinary" violence on in American families and theSevere Violence scale for research "child abuse" or "spouse on abuse." The Severity Weighted Indexis the most comprehensive

VB6X.P,V8106,9December87, Page 9

43 because it takes intoaccount both the frequency and the severity ofviolence. have statisticaladvantages because it It may'also produces an index witha greater range of scores.

Rates And Types.Expressing intra-family violence in the formof a rate ora percentage who fall into eachtype has a number of measure in most instances. advantages which make it thepreferred First, percentages and method of presenting rates are the most widely statistics, and this is understood important to theextent that the intended readership is notstatistically oriented. Second, an annualincidence rate allows comparison with annualincidence rates from other for behaviors (especially data sources, and withrates for other crime and mental illness). Finally, the Couple for a key aspects of the Violence Types allow context to be built into the whether one or both measure of violence; specifically are violent. The disadvantage of couple violence rates, and of the firstof the types is that they donot measure the frequency family. of violence withina given However, whenever this isappropriate, it can be done scales to those by applying the violence cases in which one ormore acts of violence occurred example). (see Chapter ?? foran

RECODING RESPONDENT-SPOUSEITEMS INTO HUSBAND-WIFE FORMAT

This transformationis needed if only asked to respond one member of a couple isinterviewed and is to each CTS item twice:once for what the respondent what the spouse did. did, and then for Unless this is done,SELECT IF specifications of the commands for must be included as part each statisticalanalysis. To avoid this therespondent/spouse items were transformed in intohusband/wife items, as illustrated below. In this example: Q35A to Q35SR are the CTS items A to SR forthe respondent Q36A to Q36SR are the CTS items A to SR forthe spouse

Only the SPSS commandsto transform Q35A and Q36A the identical into CTAH and CTAWare shown since procedures are used totransform Q351f. and Q36B transform Q35C and Q36C int CTBH and CTBW,to into CTDH and CTDW,etc.

1. Create H and Wversions of the items and initializeas 888:

COIVUTE CTAH-888 COMPUTE CTAW.888

2. Use IF statements to transform each pair ofvariables, e.g.:

IF (SEXR EQ1) CTAH Q35A IF (SEXR EQ1) CTAW Q36A IF (SEXR EQ2) CTAH Q36A IF (SEXR EQ2) CTAW Q35A MISSING VALUECTAH TO CTAW (-999) VAR LABELS CTAH 'CTS ITEM A: DISCUSSEDISSUE - HUSBAND' /CTAW 'CTS ITEM A:DISCUSSED ISSUE- WIFE'

Note that -999 is the missingvalue code for ALL variables in thisexample.

NORMS

The norms presented in this section differfrom those published article on the CTS (Straus, in the original 1979) in severalways.

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 10

4 4 New Normative Sample

First and most obviously, the norms presented below are basedon a sample interviewed in 1985 rather than 1975-76. Up to date norms are importantbecause of the changes which are occurring in the incidence of child abuse and wife-beating(Straus and Gelles, 1986). In addition, the 1985 sampleof 6,002 families is almost three times larger than the1975 sample. Finally, the 1985 sample does not exclude children under threeand single parent families as did the 1975 sample.

Improved Method Of Presentation

The original normative table for the violence indexwas not as useful as it could be because it combined ina single percentile distribution whether and how often it occurred. violence occurred at all The problem with that methodof norming the scales is distribution is so highly skewed that the that variation within theviolent group is obscured. In the present version, this is replaced by two tables:one giving the violence rate and the other giving percentiles per 1,000 for frequency ofoccurrence.

The violence rate can be used to compare the rate fora particular study population (for example, a particularcommunity or occupational group) with the national rate. Itis therefore primarily useful forepidemiological or sociological rasearch.*2

The percentiles, on the other hand are particulary usefulwith a clinical sample of either victims or offenders. Since, by definition, all have issue is how does the experienced violence, the amount of violence experienced bya given person or clinical compare with the national group norms for violent (but mostly notin-treatment) couples?

New Violence Indexes andTypologies

Since Chapter 3 was written in 1978, the importance ofdifferentiating various aspects of intra-family violence has become more apparent. Consequently, rather than presenting only norms for whether any assaults took place and howmany such incidents occurred, separate norms are now presented for "Minor Violence" (pushed,grabbed, objects at other, slapped shoved, threw or spanked), "Severe Violence" (kicked,bit, punched, hit with object, beat up, burned or scaled [in parent-to-child version], chocked[in spouse versions], threatened with a knife or gun, used a knifeor gun), and "Overall Violence" (i.e., whetherany acts of violence occurred, regardless of severity. Finally,for parent-to-child violence, there are norms for "Very Severe Violence." This is the measure which comes closest to measta'Aig clinical child abuse (see Gellesand Straus, 1986). In addition to these normative tables, the percentage distributionsgiven for each of the typologies described in the section on Methods OfScoring the Violence Items norms for each of those types. are the

Gender and Age-Specific Norms

Gender-Specific Norms. To our surprise, the 1975National Family jiolence Survey not find important "gender of did respondent" differences in thereporting of violence by either partner (Straus, Gelles and Steinmetz, 1980: Appendix). In the 1985 survey this pattern was repeated for "minor violence." However, for "severe violence"women reported substantially higher rates of husband-to-wife assault thandid male respondents. Consequently, this section includes separate norms for the CTSas reported by male and female respondents. Norms based on the total sampleare also because, for on most of the

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 11 45 CTSscales thereis little difference in the scoresas reported by men and women. Consequently, norms basedon roughly twice the number of are more reliable. cases are preferable becausethey

Age-Specific Norms For Parent-To-ChildViolence. Minor violence by parentstoward children. which is essentiallya measure of use of physical to the age of the child. punishment, is highly related The Child Abuse-1measure is also age-related, but clearly. not as The most severe types ofassaults against children, the Child Abuse-2measure occurs about equally often at allages from 5irth through 17 (Wauchope Where there are large and Straus, 1987). age variations, norms based on children of all appropriate. ages are not Consequently, separatenorms for parent-to-child violence 0-2, 3-6, 7-14, and 15-17, are given for ages with the exception of ChildAbuse-2 age related. which was not found to be

Violence by the child is also linked to theage of the child. Consequently, specific norms are also age- presented for child-co-childand child-to-parent violence. data are from the 1975 National These Survey because, due to the shorterinterview time available in the 1985 study, the CTS"cycle" for tactics used by the child had to beomitted.

Age Specific Norms For SpouseViolence.

ENDNOTES

1. In principle,one could add a category for those who used severe violenceno minor violence. However, there is little point to this because almosteveryone who severely assaults also engages inminor violence. In addition, there isno obvious conceptual reason for identifying those few peoplewho seriously assault, but do not also slapor shove.

2. Previous reportson the 1975 study (and some reports on the 1985 study)expressed the violence rateas a percentage of husbands, wives, or children. However,in this paper and most others,we use rate per 1,000 couples or children. There are three this. (1) Comparabili reasons for With Other Crime and ChildAbuse Rates. (NCS), which has become the The National Crime Survey de facto standard forsurvey research on the incidence of and victimization, and the crime annual rates of child abusecases reported to child protective servicesin the United States, both use rateper thousand. Adopting that standard facilitates comparison ofrates from this survey with the rates for reportedcases of child abuse, and with NCSrates for assault and other crime. Another alternativeis the Uniform Crime Reports system ofrates per 100,000. However, a rate per hundredthousand is not appropriate since oursurvey samples were in the thousands, not hundred thousands (2) Results are presentedas integers. It is customary in demography, criminology, andmedical sociology to use a rate whichenables the data to be presented in integers. For example, the 1981 cancer deathrate is given in the Vital Statistics as 184 per 100,000population ratherthan 0.00184 per capitaor 0.184% because most peoplefindit easier to conceptualize integers. Thus,the difference between the is more easily perceived cancer rate and the suicide rate when presented as 184versus 12 per 100,000, than 0.012%. as 0.184% versus (3) Avoids confusion withpercent change. In the context per thousand" instead of "x of this paper, using "x percent" avoids confusionwith "x percent change" awkwardness in spelling or the out the latter as "x percentchange in the percent violent."

VB6X.P,VB106,9December87, Page 12 46 Table2. Alpha Reliability il Coefficients for theConflict Tactics Scales IliNMIIISMIS MOSMISMii.illi Perpetrator - Victim Study Reason- Verbal Physical Relationship ing Aggr. Aggr.

Barling & Rosenbaum, 1986 Husband-to-Wife .50 .62 .88

Mitchell & Hodon, 1983* Husband-to-Wife (sample of batteredwomen) .69

Schumm et al. 1982 Rural Husband/Father** .80 .96 Wife/Mother .78 .93 Urban Husband/Father .76 .95 Wife/Mother .85 .95 Straus, 1979 Child-to-Child .56 .79 .82 Parent-to-Child .69 .77 .62 Child-to-Parent .64 .77 .78

Husband-to-Wife .50 .80 .83 Wife-to-HUsband .51 .79 .82 Couple .76 .88 .88 Straus, 1987 Parent-to-Child .59 .62 .42 Husband-to-Wife .42 .77 .86 Wife-to-Husband .43 .76 .79 Couple .48 .83 .82 Winkler & Doherty, 1983 Couple .61 .81 .83 -- Indicates that a reliability coefficient was notreported. * The reliability datafor this sample is not really comparableto the other studies because the entire sampleexperienced violence. isa measure of how much Under these circumstances,the CTS violence occurs, whereasfor non-clinical highly skeweddistribution (i.e. the fact samples the that most couplesare not violent) makes the violence Indexprimarily a measure of whether violenceoccurred at all. ** Husband/Father meansacts of aggression by the the child who completed husband toward his wifeor toward the questionnaire. The same procedure Wife/Mother data. See was used for the Schumm et al. footnote2.

VB6.TB,220ctober87, Page 2 47 .,

Table 3. Correlation of Spouse ReportCTS Scores with =111i1=3, Student Report CTSScores

Correlation (r) for: Conflict Tactics Scale Husbands Wives (N-57) (N-60) Reasoning Verbal Aggression .19 -.12 Violence .51 .43 .64 .33

Table 4. Percentage of RespondentsReporting One or More Acts of PhysicalViolence

IIIIIIIIIIIIIINZ.M

Source of Data % Violent in LastYear Husbands Wives Spouses* Students* 9.1 17.9 Students** 16.7 9.5 11.3 11.4

*From Bulcroft and Straus, 1975 (Husband N- 57, Wife N - 60). **From Straus, 1974a(N - 385).

VB6.TB,220ctober87, Page 3 7/, Nfciiv-

Table N1. AnnualIncidence Rates For Assaults AgainstSpouses and Children 4.71MMIMIAllai Rate Per 1,000 Couplesor Type of Intra-Family Violencel Children As Reportedby: Total Husbands Wives

A, VIOLENCE BETWEENH7SBANDAND WIFE MINOR assaults during the yr (slap, push,etc) 150 144 154 SEVERE assaults (kick,punch, stab, etc) 63 53 ANY assaults duringthe year 71 161 156 165 MINOR assaults by theHUSBAND 109 105 SEVERE assaults bythe HUSBAND ("wife 112 beating") 34 14 ANY assaults by theHUSBAND 50 116 108 123 MINOR assaults bythe WIFE 116 114 SEVERE assaults bythe WIFE 118 48 50 ANY assaults by theWIFE 46 124 125 124

B VIOLENCE BY PARENTS

Total Fathers Mothers ANY assaultsagainst 0-2 year olds 575 ANY assaults against3-6 year olds ANY assaults 894 agaLnst 7-10 year olds 777 ANY assaults against11-14 year olds ANY assaults against 539 15-17 year olds 287 SEVERE assaults against 0-2 year olds 79 SEVERE assaultsagainst 3-6 year olds 143 SEVERE assaultsagainst 7-10 year olds SEVERE assaults 143 against 11-14 yearolds 107 SEVERE assaultsagainst 15-17. year olds 70

VERY SEVERE assaultsagainst 0-2 year olds VERY SEVERE assaults 22 against 3-6 year olds 26 VERY SEVERE assaults against 7-10 year olds 24 VERY SEVERE assaultsagainst 11-14 year olds VERY SEVERE assaults 25 against 15-17 year olds 21

Footnotes for Table N1

Section A ratesare based a nationally married or cohabiting representative sample of6,002 currently couples interviewedin 1985. differ from those Note: The rates inSection A in Straus and Gelles(1986) because the computed in a rates in that paperare way which enabled the1985 rates to be compared with themore restricted sample andmore restricted version of in the 1975 study. the Conflict TacticsScale used

Section B ratesare based on the 1985 sample age 17 and under. vote: of 3,232 householdswith a chil The rates shown insection B differ from and Gelles (1986) for those in Straus the reasons given infootnote 1.

VB6.TB,220ctober87, Page 4 49 .4. Table N2. Annual Incidence Rates ForAssaults Against Siblings andParents, 1975* .71.711. Rate Per 1,000Children Type of Intra-Family Violencel As Reported hx: Total Fathers Mothers

A, VIOLENCE AGAINSTSIBLINGS ANY assaultsonsibling by child 3-6 823 ANY assaultsonsibling by child 7-10 829 ANY assaultsonsibling by child 11-14 741 ANY assaultsonsibling by child 15-17 557

SEVERE assaultson sibling by child 3-7 592 SEVERE assaultson sibling by child 7-10 553 SEVERE assaultson sibling by child 11-14 442 SEVERE assaultson sibling by child 15-17 309

B Assaults AGAINSTPARENTS

ANY assaultson parent by child 3-6 327 ANY assaultson parent by child 7-10 136 ANY assaultson parent by child 11 14 92 ANY assaultson parent by chid 15-19 90

SEVERE assaultson parent by child 3-6 SEVERE assaults 213 on parent by child 7-10 66 SEVERE assaultson parent by child 11-14 SEVERE assaults 28 on parent by child13-17 35 * The rates in this tableare basBd on the 1975-76 by children study beause dataon violence was not collected in the1985 survey.

VB6.TB,220ctober87, Page 6 50 IP* r/Arl Table N3. Percentile NormsBased On Responses of Husbands, A National Fanily ViolenceResurvey Sample, 1985

Couple Husband-to-Wife Centile Wife-to-Hbsband RS VB MV*SV*AN* RS VB* MV* Se AV* RS VB Se AY* Centile

5 1 10 5 15 10 20 1 15 25 1 20 30 1 1 25 35 1 1 30

40 1 2 35 1 1 45 2 40 1 50 3 45 55 3 2 2 50 2 60 4 3 4 2 3 55 65 5 3 3 60 4 5 2 70 2 4 6 6 6 4 65 2 3 75 4 6 7 8 5 5 70 3 3 80 5 6 8 8 9 6 75 6 6 85 9 10 8 8 80 12 4 9 4 90 8 10 12 16 18 10 85 6 22 7 95 16 9 16 16 90 50 26 8 25 9 12 99 45 75 83 29 24 95 16 25 46 75 83 99 RS - Reasoning, VB - Verbal Aggression, MV- Minor Violence, MV The norms for Reasoning - Severe Violence, AV -.AnyViolence and Verbal Aggressioncover all cases. are for cases in which at least The norms for the threevdolence indexes one violent incident occumd.See text. Table N4. Percentile Norms Based on Responsesof Wives, National Family ViolenceResurvey Sample, 1985

Couple Husband -to -Wife Centile RS VB me SV*AV* Wife -to- Husband RS Vg* MV*SV* AV* RS VB MV* SV* AV* Centile

C. RAW SCCRES ASREPCRTED BY WIVES 1 5 1 10 5 15 10 20 1 1 ls 25 1 1 20 30 1 25 35 1 1 30 40 2 1 35 45 2 1 40 50 3 3 45 55 2 2 50 60 2 4 3 4 2 2 55 65 3 2 3 5 6 3 3 60 70 3 6 4 7 2 65 75 4 4 8 8 8 4 3 4 70 80 4 5 5 8 10 11 5 6 75 85 6 8 7 10 12 14 6 4 7 80 90 7 12 9 18 17 8 6 9 85 22 9 1416 95 34 33 45 9 8 12 90 242235 99 79 80 15 23 20 95 120 43 8088 48 47 71 99

RS - Reasoning, VB- Verbal Aggression, MV The norms for Reasoning - Minor Violence, MV- Severe Violence, AV and Verbal Aggressioncover all cases. - Any Violerre are for cases in whichat least one violent The norms for the threeviolence indexes incident occured.See text.

5.) VB6.T13,22Cctober87,Page 8 Appendix 1: THE CONFLICT TACTICS SCALES, ':DUPLEFORM Pal ASK IN SEQUENCE Q35:". Q36a AND (IF NEVER ON BOTH Q35a AND Q36a) ASK Q37a. THEN ASK Q35b, Q36B AND (IF NEVER ON BOTH Q35b AND Q36b) ASK Q378,ETC.

Q35. No matter how well a couple get along, there are times when they disagree,get annoyed with the other person, or just havespats or fights because they're in a bad mood some other reason. er tired or for They also use many different ways of tryingto settle their differencese I'm going to read some things that you and your (spouse/partner) might do whenyou have an argument. I would like you to toll no howmany times (Once, Twice, 3-5 times, 6-10 times, 11-20 times, or more than 20 times) in thepast 12 months you (READ ITEM)

Q36. Thinking back over the last 12 months you've been together, was thereever an occasion when (your seouseipartnet) (READ ITEM)? Toll me how often (he/she)...

Q37. (IF EITHER "NEVER" OR "DON'TKNOW" ON ITEM FOR BOTH Q35 Has it ever happened? anQ36, ASK Q37 FOR THAT ITEM)

035. Respondent 036. Spouse In Past Year In Zest Year 1 Once 1 Once 2 Twice 2 Twice 3 3-5 Times 232221WILI...811Ik2S1 3 3-5 Times ")ever" on both 4 6-10 Times 4 6-10 Times Q35 and q36: Has 5 11-20 Times 5 - 11-20 Times it Ever hsppenedt 6 Here than 20 6 Here than 20 1 Yos 0 Never(don't read) 0 Never(don't read) 0 No

A. Discussed an issue calmly 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 B. Cot information to back up your/his/her side of things 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 10 C. Brought in, or tried to bring in, someone to help settle things 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 D. Insulted or swore at him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 10 E. Sulked or refused to talk about an issue 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 F. Stomped out of the roomor house or yard 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 10

G. Cried 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 H. Did or said something to spite him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0

I. Threatened to hit or throw something at him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 10 J. Threw or smashed or hit or kicked something 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 10 K. Threw something At him /her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 L. Pushed, Crabbed, or shoved him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0

H. Slapped him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 N. Kicked, bit, or hit him/her /you with a fist 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 O. Hit or tried to hit him/her /you with something 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0

P. Beat him/her/you up 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0

Q. Choked him/her/you 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 R. Threatene4 him/her/you with a knife or gun 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 0 S. Used a knife or fired a gun 1 2 3 4 5 6 0 1 2 3 4 6 0 1 0

1. The question numbers are from the 1985 NationalFamily Violence Resurvey interview schedule as given in the appendix to Callas and Strsus, 1988. The CTS is ngl copyrighted. Anyone may therefore use or modify it without permission.However, if you are thinking of using the instrument, write for papers whichmight apply to your proposed use. In addition, I would appreciate copies of any reports using the CTS so that the bibiligraphycan be updated for the benefit of other scholars. 53