The Differential Effects of Intimate Terrorism and Situational Couple Violence: Findings From the National Violence Against Women Survey

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2005 26: 322Journal of Family IssuesMichael P. Johnson and Janel M. LeoneViolence Against Women Survey

The Differential Effects of Intimate Terrorism and Situational Couple Violence: Findings From the National

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10.1177/0192513X04270345JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / April 2005Johnson, Leone / INTIMATE TERRORISM AND COUPLE VIOLENCE

The Differential Effectsof Intimate Terrorism and

Situational Couple ViolenceFindings From the National

Violence Against Women Survey

MICHAEL P. JOHNSONJANEL M. LEONE

Pennsylvania State University

Data from the National Violence Against Women Survey show that the two major forms ofhusband violence toward their wives (intimate terrorism and situational couple violence)have different effects on their victims. Victims of intimate terrorism are attacked more fre-quently and experience violence that is less likely to stop. They are more likely to be injured,to exhibit more of the symptoms of posttraumatic stress syndrome, to use painkillers (per-haps also tranquilizers), and to miss work. They have left their husbands more often, andwhen they do leave, they are more likely to acquire their own residence. If we want to under-stand the true impact of wife abuse from survey data (rather than from agency data), we mustmake distinctions among types of violence so that the data used to describe battering are notdiluted by data regarding other types of partner violence.

Keywords: domestic violence; battering; control; marriage; gender

M.P. Johnson (1995) has argued that there are two distinct forms of maleviolence against female partners. The basic pattern in what he called patri-archal terrorism (which we will refer to as intimate terrorism, as he does inmore recent articles) is violence that is embedded in a general pattern ofcontrolling behaviors, indicating that the perpetrator is attempting to exertgeneral control over his partner. Johnson suggests that this form of vio-lence is what is typically intended by terms such as domestic violence,wife beating, and spousal abuse. In contrast, the intimate partner violencethat he called common couple violence (which we will refer to as situa-tional couple violence, as he does in more recent articles) is violence that

322

Authors’Note: This is a revised version of a paper presented at the Tenth International Con-ference on Personal Relationships, Brisbane, Australia, July 2000.

JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES, Vol. 26 No. 3, April 2005 322-349DOI: 10.1177/0192513X04270345© 2005 Sage Publications

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is not connected to a general pattern of control. He describes this violenceas involving specific arguments that escalate to violence but showing norelationship-wide evidence of an attempt to exert general control overone’s partner. M. P. Johnson (1995) and Johnson and Ferraro (2000) havemade the case that these distinctions are central because they have impli-cations for the development of theories of interpersonal violence, the de-sign of educational programs and intervention strategies, and the imple-mentation of public policy. We believe that these distinctions betweendifferent forms of partner violence are also important for understandingthe effects of violence on its victims.

M. P. JOHNSON’S CONTROL TYPOLOGYOF INTIMATE PARTNER VIOLENCE

The theoretical foundations of Johnson’s control typology aregrounded in the ostensibly mutually contradictory analyses of feministtheory and family violence theory. Feminist theory (Dobash & Dobash,1979; Stark & Flitcraft, 1996; Stets, 1988; Yllo & Bograd, 1988) concep-tualizes intimate partner violence as a matter of control, rooted in patriar-chal traditions of male dominance in heterosexual relationships, espe-cially marriage. Family violence theory sees intimate partner violence as amatter of conflict, rooted in the everyday stresses of family life that pro-duce conflicts that may or may not escalate to violence (Straus, Gelles, &Steinmetz, 1980; Straus & Smith, 1990). Johnson asserts that althoughthese theories have generally been framed as alternative understandingsof the same phenomenon, they are better understood as explanations oftwo essentially different forms of intimate partner violence: one rooted inan attempt to exert general control over the relationship (intimate ter-rorism) and the other arising out of particular conflicts (situational cou-ple violence).

Intimate terrorism is defined by the attempt to dominate one’s partnerand to exert general control over the relationship, domination that is mani-fested in the use of a wide range of power and control tactics, including vi-olence. Although many authors working in the feminist tradition have de-scribed this general pattern of controlling behavior (Campbell, Rose,Kub, & Nedd, 1998; Dobash & Dobash, 1979; Ferraro, 1997; M. P. John-son, 1995; Kirkwood, 1993; Lloyd & Emery, 2000; Stark & Flitcraft,1996; Yllo & Bograd, 1988), the best known description is probably thatembodied in Pence and Paymar’s (1993, p. 185) Power and ControlWheel, which includes the following nonviolent control tactics: emo-tional abuse, isolation, using children, using male privilege, economic

Johnson, Leone / INTIMATE TERRORISM AND COUPLE VIOLENCE 323



abuse, threats, intimidation, and blaming. The core idea of these theoriesof coercive control is that even the nonviolent control tactics take on a vio-lent meaning that they would not have in the absence of their connectionwith violence. Imagine, for example, the different meaning and emotionalimpact of an intimidating look from a nonviolent partner and a similar ges-ture from a partner who has already demonstrated his willingness to be vi-olent. As the victims of intimate terrorism often report, “all he had to dowas look at me that way and I would do whatever he wanted” (Dobash &Dobash, 1979).

Situational couple violence is defined as intimate partner violence thatis not embedded in such a general pattern of controlling behaviors. Its par-ticular causes may vary from couple to couple and across different inci-dents of violence experienced by the same couple, but there is no relation-ship-wide pattern of controlling behaviors. This form of intimate partnerviolence is not rooted in a general pattern of control but occurs when spe-cific conflict situations escalate to violence. It is probably best understoodthrough the conceptual framework of family conflict theory (Bradbury,Rogge, & Lawrence, 2001; Gelles & Straus, 1988; Steinmetz, 1986;Straus & Gelles, 1990; Straus et al., 1980), in which it assumed that con-flict is endemic to family life; that in the American cultural context, somekinds of family violence are considered acceptable under some condi-tions; and that, therefore, family conflicts will sometimes lead to violence.Johnson argued that this understanding of family violence does indeeddescribe most of the intimate partner violence that is uncovered in generalsurveys.

The violent acts involved in both situational couple violence and inti-mate terrorism can range from relatively innocuous behavior, such aspushing and shoving, to life-threatening attacks or homicide, and bothtypes of violent relationships can involve anything from infrequent, iso-lated incidents to regular assaults. In the case of frequent situational cou-ple violence, for example, the relationship may involve areas of conflictthat continue to be unresolved and one or more partners who regularlychoose to resort to violence in the context of those conflicts. In the case ofinfrequent intimate terrorism, one assault may be enough to establish alevel of fear that allows the intimate terrorist to exert control almost exclu-sively by means of nonviolent tactics. Thus, the two types of violence arenot defined by the nature or frequency of violent acts but solely in terms ofthe relationship-level control context in which they are embedded. Inti-mate terrorism is violence that is embedded in a general pattern of control;situational couple violence is not.

324 JOURNAL OF FAMILY ISSUES / April 2005



Why create a typology rather than using control as a continuous vari-able? The core theoretical idea that informs M. P. Johnson’s typology isthat intimate terrorism is driven by an attempt to exert general control overone’s partner, whereas situational couple violence is a much less coherentphenomenon. Although there may be considerable variability in the levelof control exhibited in intimate partner relationships, among violent cou-ples, there is a qualitative distinction between these two types. Johnson ar-gues that because these types of violence have different psychological andsocial roots, interpersonal dynamics, and consequences for the victim,much of the empirical domestic violence literature is virtually meaning-less. Without operationalization of the distinctions, the observed statisti-cal relationships (whether strong, weak, or nonexistent) are a function ofunknown mixes of the different types of violence. For example, studiesthat do not make these distinctions have generally found that there is moreviolence in cohabiting relationships than in marriages, a finding that haspuzzled theorists who see the “marriage license as a hitting license” (Stets& Straus, 1989). Johnson’s typological approach suggests that the patriar-chal traditions of marriage should affect primarily intimate terrorism, inwhich control is a major factor, whereas the inevitable conflicts of familylife that are the source of situational couple violence are as likely to be afeature of cohabitation as they are of marriage. In fact, when Macmillanand Gartner (1999) recently distinguished between situational couple vio-lence and intimate terrorism in their analysis of the Canadian ViolenceAgainst Women Survey, they found that intimate terrorism was indeedmore prevalent among married couples. It was only situational couple vio-lence that was more likely in cohabiting relationships (Table 3, p. 954). Ina similar example of the clarity to be gained by distinguishing betweentypes of violence, Johnson has shown that the longstanding debate regard-ing the gender symmetry of domestic violence can be resolved by makinghis distinctions. Reanalyzing data from Frieze’s Pittsburgh study (Frieze& Browne, 1989), he has shown that situational couple violence in hetero-sexual relationships is roughly gender symmetric, whereas intimate ter-rorism is perpetrated almost entirely by men (M. P. Johnson, 2001). Bothof these examples relate to the causes of intimate terrorism and situationalcouple violence and lend support to the theoretical argument that intimateterrorism has its primary roots in male domination of women, as feministtheorists have long contended. Our goal in this article, however, is toinvestigate the other end of this theory of intimate partner violence byasking whether the different types of violence have different effects on thevictims.




THE EFFECTS OF INTIMATE PARTNER VIOLENCE

Researchers have found that domestic violence has many negative con-sequences for its victims. In addition to the injuries that are the immediateconsequence of violence, there are other physical and psychologicalhealth risks (Giles-Sims, 1998; Holtzworth-Munroe, Smutzler, & Sandin,1997). The psychological effects include posttraumatic stress disorder,depression, and lowered self-esteem (Kirkwood, 1993). The economic ef-fect of domestic violence is another area of focus. Browne, Salomon, andBassuk (1999) report that women who experienced violence from malepartners during a 12-month period “had about one third the odds of work-ing at least 30 hours per week for 6 months or more during the followingyear as did women who had not experienced such aggression” (p. 417).Other examinations of the effects of battering on women’s employmenthave reported that abusive men deliberately undermine women’s employ-ment by depriving them of transportation, harassing them at work, turningoff alarm clocks, beating them before job interviews, and disappearingwhen they promised to provide child care (Brandwein, 1998; Lloyd,1997).

Unfortunately, the research that has demonstrated these negative ef-fects has not distinguished among types of domestic violence. The generalhypothesis of this study is that the negative effects of domestic violenceare more severe for intimate terrorism than they are for situational coupleviolence. This is not to say that situational couple violence has no negativeeffects on its victims, only that they are on average less severe than theeffects of intimate terrorism.

The data that we use allow us to test this general hypothesis in five ar-eas. First, we expect the pattern of the violence itself to differ, the violenceof intimate terrorism being (on average) more frequent and more severe.We remind the reader that the two types of violence are not defined interms of frequency or severity of violent acts but rather in terms of controlcontext. We hypothesize that the intention to exert general control makesintimate terrorism more likely than situational couple violence to involvesevere or frequent violence. This is a matter of theory, not definition.Some intimate terrorists may gain control without resorting to a high levelof violence. Similarly, situational couple violence, although more likelythan intimate terrorism to involve only isolated low-level violence, can insome cases be frequent or deadly. Second, we expect that immediate inju-ries and other negative medical outcomes will be more likely for intimateterrorism than they are in the case of situational couple violence. Thegreater likelihood of immediate injuries would follow from the correla-




tion of intimate terrorism with frequency and severity of violence. Thereare, however, also likely to be physical health consequences that arecaused by the long-term stress of being trapped in a controlling, threaten-ing relationship. Third, the general pattern of control and the implicitthreat of violence involved in intimate terrorism will be more likely to un-dermine the victims’ psychological health than will the less systematicthreat of situational couple violence. Fourth, the systematic control in-volved in intimate terrorism will be more likely to interfere with the dailyactivities of life, including employment. Finally, the generally negativeeffects of intimate terrorism should lead its victims to be less satisfied withthe relationship, more likely to attempt to escape, and more likely to seekhelp.

METHOD

SAMPLE

The data used in the current study are from the National ViolenceAgainst Women Survey (NVAWS), a cross-sectional national random-sample telephone interview intended to examine several types of violenceagainst women, including rape, physical assault, emotional abuse, andstalking (Tjaden & Thoennes, 1999). Data were collected from a national,random-digit sample of telephone households in the United States; 8,005men and 8,000 women 18 years of age or older were interviewed. Becausemuch of the published work dealing with partner violence focuses on mar-ried respondents and because other studies have shown differences in thenature of partner violence as a function of marital status, we chose to limitour analyses to the 4,967 women who were married at the time of the inter-view. The data we use refer to their current husbands.

Respondents in our subsample ranged in age from 18 to 97 (M = 44.55,SD = 13.89). At the time of the survey, 46% of the respondents reportedworking full-time, 15% were employed part-time, 21% were homemak-ers, and 12% were retired. The other 10% were either in the military, stu-dents, or doing something else. Furthermore, 87% of the respondents re-ported themselves as White, 5% as African American, 2% as Asian, 5% asmixed race, and 1% as American Indian or Alaskan Native. Nine percentof the respondents had not graduated from high school, 36% had earned ahigh school degree, 28% had some college education, 18% had earned acollege degree, and 9% had completed postgraduate work.




PROCEDURE

The NVAWS was conducted by a national research organization basedin New York City. Prospective participants were first given an extensivepretest to determine eligibility. Interviews were acquired by means of acomputer-assisted interviewing system. The version of the survey com-pleted by women was administered in 1995 and 1996. Because of the sen-sitive content included in the survey, females interviewed female respon-dents, and Spanish-speaking respondents were interviewed in Spanish bybilingual interviewers.

Participation rates were calculated using the following formula: thenumber of completed interviews, including those that were screened outas ineligible, divided by the total number of completed interviews, refus-als, and terminated interviews. Using this formula, the participation rateamong women was 72%. Of the eligible women who started the interview,97% completed the survey.

MEASURE

Physical violence. Physical violence was operationalized as both acontinuous variable and a dichotomous variable, based on responses to a12-item, yes-no version of the physical violence items of the Conflict Tac-tics Scales (Straus, 1990a, 1990b). The continuous variable, the ViolenceScale, is the number of the 12 violent behaviors ever perpetrated in the re-lationship by each respondent’s husband. Cronbach’s alpha is .88. Theoverall mean of the scale for the reported behavior of all husbands is .87(SD = 1.98), with scores ranging from 0 to 12. The dichotomous violencevariable was created such that respondents who experienced none of the12 violent acts (n = 4,721) were coded nonviolent. Respondents who ex-perienced one or more of the 12 violent acts (n = 246) were coded violent.

We also created a Severe Violence Scale based on the items conven-tionally identified as severe violence. These items were choke or attemptto drown, hit you with an object, beat you up, threaten you with a gun,threaten you with a knife or other weapon besides a gun, use a gun on you,and use a knife or other weapon. The Severe Violence Scale score is sim-ply the number of those seven items for which the respondent replied yesregarding her husband’s behavior. Cronbach’s alpha for the scale is .78.Scores covered the full range from 0 to 7, with an overall mean among allhusbands of .30.




Nonviolent control. The NVAWS included seven items assessing non-violent control tactics used by the respondent’s husband. Many of theseitems were adopted from the Canadian Violence Against Women Survey(H. Johnson, 1996) and closely resemble items included in the Psycholog-ical Maltreatment of Women Survey (Tolman, 1989). They include thefollowing: Thinking about your current husband, would you say he . . .tries to limit your contact with family and friends? . . . is jealous or posses-sive? . . . insists on knowing who you are with at all times? . . . calls younames or puts you down in front of others? . . . makes you feel inade-quate? . . . shouts or swears at you? . . . prevents you from knowing aboutor having access to the family income even when you ask? Response op-tions to each of the items were no (0) or yes (1).

A principal components analysis was conducted to determine if theitems represented more than one construct. The pattern of eigenvalues(2.52, 1.06, .88, .71, .66, .59, and .58) with a strong first factor suggestedto us that a reasonable seven-item scale could be constructed from theseitems. The Control Scale score is the number of control tactics the respon-dent’s husband was reported to have used, with a potential range of 0 to 7.The overall mean of the scale for all husbands is .39 (SD = .94), the medianis 0, and actual scores cover the entire range from 0 to 7. Cronbach’s alphais .70.

To operationalize the distinction between intimate terrorism and situa-tional couple violence, we needed to choose a cutting point to distinguishbetween high and low control. To avoid choosing a totally arbitrary cut-ting point for the distinction between high and low patterns of control, weused a cluster analysis of the seven individual items in the Control Scale toguide us. A k-means cluster analysis with a two-cluster solution was per-formed on the seven variables to identify natural clusters of controllingbehavior for the violent husbands. We then chose our cutting point for thedichotomization to maximize the fit between the cluster solution and thedichotomized Control Scale. (Details are available from the authors.)Husbands using three or more of the seven control tactics were coded highcontrol (n = 211), those using two or fewer as low control (n = 4,575). Forresearchers who may be using other measures of control, we point out thatthis cutting point corresponds to two standard deviations above the meanof the Control Scale for the reported behavior of all husbands in theNVAWS.

Violence type. Intimate terrorism is defined as physical violence em-bedded in a general pattern of control, and situational couple violence is




physical violence that is not embedded in a general pattern of control. Us-ing the dichotomization of the Control Scale discussed above, the behav-ior of violent husbands who were reported to have used three or more ofthe seven control tactics was coded as intimate terrorism (n = 81). If a vio-lent husband was reported to have used two or fewer of the seven controltactics, his behavior was coded as situational couple violence (n = 149).

One issue raised for us by the outcome of this coding process was thesurprisingly high representation of intimate terrorism among the violentmen in this sample. M. P. Johnson (1995) has argued that there should bealmost no intimate terrorism in general survey samples, and he demon-strated for one such survey that only 10% of the male violence was inti-mate terrorism (Johnson, 2001). Why does 35% of husbands’ violence inthe NVAWS consist of intimate terrorism? We believe that the answer liesin the general framing of the NVAWS interview. We agree with Straus’s(1999) argument that the more an interview is framed in terms of violenceor crime in the minds of the respondents (rather than as conflict, as it isframed in his National Survey of Family Violence), the less violencewould be reported, but the more severe that violence would be. As Strauspoints out, the NVAWS is not framed for the respondent as a study of fam-ily life or even of family conflict but is presented as a study of personalsafety, injury, and violence, with a decided crime overtone. We would ar-gue (analogously to Straus) that in such a frame of mind, a respondentwho experienced violence in a general context of control would be morelikely to report that violence than would a respondent who experiencedmore isolated violence.

Injuries sustained from violence. Unfortunately, the only injury datacollected in the NVAWS concerns injuries sustained in the most recent in-cident of partner violence: Were you physically injured during this [mostrecent] incident? Of the respondents whose husbands had been violent,78% had not been injured in the most recent incident (n = 192), and 22%had been injured (n = 54).

Psychological well-being. A 21-item scale adapted from the Impact ofEvent Scale (Weiss & Marmar, 1997) was used in the NVAWS to assessrespondents’ symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) result-ing from their husband’s violence. Respondents who had experienced vi-olence were instructed to think about the physical violence and respond toa list of difficulties people commonly face following such stressful events.Respondents were instructed to report how much each of the difficultieshad bothered them in the previous 7 days. Some of the statements included




“I had trouble falling asleep,” “I felt irritable and angry,” “I felt it didn’thappen or wasn’t real,” “I was jumpy and easily startled,” “my feelingsabout it were kind of numb,” and “reminders of it caused me to have physi-cal reactions, such as sweating, trouble breathing, nausea, or heart pound-ing.” Response options were not at all (1), a little bit (2), moderately (3),and quite a bit (4). The PTSD Symptom Scale score was the mean of allitems answered for respondents who answered at least 19 of the 21 items.The overall mean was 1.47 (SD = .67), the median was 1.14, and the scoresranged from 1.00 to 3.76. Cronbach’s alpha was .95.

An eight-item Depression Symptoms Scale, based on questions used inthe SF-36 Health Survey, U.S. Acute Version, 1.0, was used to assess levelof depression of all respondents. The time referent for all items was thepast week, and the items were as follows: How often in the past week . . .did you feel full of pep? . . . did you have a lot of energy? . . . have you beena happy person? . . . did you feel tired? . . . have you been very nervous? . . .have you felt so down in the dumps that nothing could cheer you up? . . .did you feel downhearted and blue? . . . did you feel worn out? Three of theeight questions were reverse coded for scoring purposes. Response op-tions were never (1), rarely (2), some of the time (3), and most of the time(4). The mean was calculated for each respondent who answered all of theitems. The mean score was 1.93 (SD = .51), and the scores ranged from1.00 to 4.00. Cronbach’s alpha was .78.

Drug use. Drug use in the month prior to the interview was assessed forall respondents, regardless of whether they experienced partner violence.We examined the relationship between type of violence and three specificdrug categories: (a) tranquilizers, sleeping pills, or sedatives; (b) anti-depressants; and (c) pain killers. Respondents answered yes or no to usingeach type.

Interference of violence with everyday activities. Once again, we werehandicapped by the fact that lost-work-time questions were asked onlywith respect to the effects of the most recent violent incident. Effects onthe respondent’s labor force participation were assessed by responses tothe following yes-or-no question: Did you ever have to take time off fromwork for which you were getting paid [because of this incident]?

Leaving and seeking help. Respondents whose husbands had been vio-lent were asked the following: Did you ever leave your current husbandbecause he was violent toward you? If the respondent answered affirma-tively, she was asked the following: How many different times did you




leave? Answers to this question ranged from 1 to 78. We combined thesetwo questions to create a continuous variable of the number of times leftthat ranged from 0 (never left) to 78. The third question, referring to onlythe most recent time the respondent left her husband, asked the following:Where did you stay? Respondents chose from a list of the following possi-ble places: relative’s house, with a friend, got her own place, safe house,hotel, homeless shelter, he left and she stayed, or other.

Demographic characteristics. Respondent demographic characteris-tics included age (18 to 97 years old), education level (1 = no schooling to7 = postgraduate), 1995 household income before taxes (1 = less than$5,000 to 10 = greater than $100,000), and race (White, Black, Other).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In most cases, the questions we analyzed were asked only of respon-dents who had reported violence from their husbands. Whenever a ques-tion was also asked of other respondents, we presented data comparing theresponses of women experiencing each type of violence with the responsesof women who had never experienced violence from their husbands.

Hypothesis 1: Intimate terrorism involves more frequent and severe physicalviolence, and the violence is less likely to stop.

First, NVAWS respondents who reported that their husband had beenviolent toward them were asked the following: How many different timeshas he done this to you [been physically violent]? The means for respon-dents who reported any physical violence were 8.13 (SD = 17.50) for inti-mate terrorism and 2.63 (SD = 2.88) for situational couple violence (F =12.99, df = 1,204, p < .001). These results indicate that women subjectedto intimate terrorism experienced more frequent violence compared towomen who experienced situational couple violence, thereby confirmingthe first part of Hypothesis 1.

Second, we examined the relationship between violence type and Se-vere Violence Scale score, which is the number of different severely vio-lent behaviors husbands were reported to have employed. Out of a possi-ble score of 7, the mean score for victims of intimate terrorism was 1.07(SD = 1.55), compared to .53 (SD = 1.02) for situational couple violence(F = 10.21, df = 1,228, p < .01). On average, victims of intimate terrorismexperienced significantly more severe violence than victims of situational




couple violence. These findings empirically support the second componentof Hypothesis 1.

Because some reviewers have suggested that the findings regardingfrequency and severity are tautological, we feel it is important to remindthe reader that the types of violence are not defined in terms of frequencyor severity or any other characteristic of the acts of physical violencethemselves but rather in terms of the extent to which the violent husbanduses a variety of other, nonviolent, control tactics. Although there are av-erage differences between the two types of violence in terms of the fre-quency and severity of violence, in some cases, even situational couple vi-olence can be quite frequent or extremely severe. Similarly, it is notalways the case that intimate terrorism involves frequent or severe vio-lence. For example, in these data, there is one case of situational couple vi-olence in which the husband had been violent 20 times, and there are 19cases of intimate terrorism in which the husbands had been violent onlyonce. With respect to severity, 52% of the perpetrators of intimate terror-ism had never committed an act of severe violence. Thirty-two percent ofthe perpetrators of situational couple violence had committed at least oneact of severe violence, and there is even one case of situational couple vio-lence in which the perpetrator had used all seven forms of severe violence.The finding that intimate terrorism is more likely than situational coupleviolence to be frequent and severe is hardly tautological.

Finally, intimate terrorism has also been shown to be less likely to stop(M. P. Johnson, 1999). Although there was no direct question in theNVAWS regarding desistance, we could at least look at differences be-tween the two types of violence in terms of date of the most recent inci-dent. A report of no violence in the past 12 months provides a reasonableindicator of desistance. Results indicated that 99% of the situational cou-ple violence group had experienced no violence in the past 12 months, ascompared with 78% of the intimate terrorism group (χ2 = 16.23, df = 1, p <.001), supporting the third part of Hypothesis 1.

Hypothesis 2: Intimate terrorism does more damage to the physical health of itsvictims than situational couple violence does.

The NVAWS data allow only a very conservative test of this hypothe-sis, as injury data were collected regarding only the most recent incident,which in most cases will not be the most severe level of injury ever experi-enced. No questions were asked regarding injuries either throughout thehistory of the violent relationship or for the most severe incident. Never-theless, the data do provide support for Hypothesis 2. Logistic regression




analyses (Table 1) indicate that type of violence is significantly related toinjury both at the zero order (Model 1) and after controlling for a fewbackground characteristics of respondents (Model 2). Although the coef-ficient for violence type is reduced somewhat by the control for ViolenceScale Score (Model 3), the odds of being injured were still two and a halftimes higher for women experiencing intimate terrorism than for those ex-periencing situational couple violence. A test for the interaction betweenviolence type and Violence Scale Score was not significant (exp(B) = .78,p = .16).

It is clear from these analyses that intimate terrorism is more likely toproduce injuries than situational couple violence is, but we believe that therelationship is mediated much more by level of violence than these datasuggest. Remember that the Violence Scale refers to all violence in the re-lationship, whereas the injury data refer only to the most recent incident.Although intimate terrorism does not always involve frequent or severeviolence, the use of violence to exert general control will, on average, pro-duce more frequent and more severe acts of violence that will in turn in-crease the likelihood of injury.

Hypothesis 3: Intimate terrorism does more damage to the psychologicalhealth of its victims than situational couple violence does.

To explore the relationship between type of violence and respondents’scores on the PTSD Symptom Scale, we conducted a hierarchical Ordi-nary Least Squares (OLS) regression (see Table 2). Results indicated thatexperiencing intimate terrorism and increased scores on the ViolenceScale were both significantly related to higher scores on the PTSD Symp-tom Scale (see Model 3). Model 4 shows a significant interaction betweenthese two factors, indicating that victims of intimate terrorism reportedsignificantly more PTSD symptoms as level of violence increased,whereas this was not the case for victims of situational couple violence(see Figure 1).

In addition to PTSD symptoms, we examined the relationship betweentype of violence respondents experienced and their scores on the Depres-sion Symptoms Scale. Results of a hierarchical OLS regression revealedthat victims of both intimate terrorism and situational couple violencescored significantly higher on the Depression Symptoms Scale than didwomen who did not experience violence (see Table 3). The difference indepression symptoms between types of violence was not statistically sig-nificant (t = .96, p = .34). Results also indicated that scores on the ViolenceScale were significantly related to scores on the Depression Symptoms




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vio

lenc

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ence

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.05.

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< .0

1.

335



Scale, as were age, education level, and income (Model 3). The interactionbetween violence type and Violence Scale score was not statistically sig-nificant (t = 1.35, p = .18), indicating that experiencing any type ofviolence and higher scores on the Violence Scale independently increaseddepression symptoms.

The final analyses concerning respondent well-being examined druguse, specifically respondents’ use of painkillers, tranquilizers, and anti-depressants in the month prior to the interview. Three separate hierarchi-cal logistic regression analyses were conducted. First, results indicatedthat victims of intimate terrorism were more likely than women in nonvio-lent relationships to use painkillers, even after considering demographicinformation and scores on the Violence Scale (see Table 4). Experiencingsituational couple violence did not increase the likelihood of using pain-


0.75

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1.50

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2.00

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Violence Scale Score

PTSD

Sym

ptom

s Sc

ale

Intimate Terrorism Situational Couple Violence

Figure 1: PTSD Symptoms by Type and Level of ViolenceNOTE: PTSD = post-traumatic stress disorder.

(text continues on p. 340)



TA

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337



TA

BL

E 3

Pre

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intim

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ence

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rvio

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Whi

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< .0

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338



TA

BL

E 4

Pre

dict

ors

of P

aink

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Use

(L

ogis

tic

Reg

ress

ion)

Mod

el 1

Mod

el 2

Mod

el 3

Pre

dict

ors

BSE

exp(

B)

BSE

exp(

B)

BSE

exp(

B)

Con

stan

t–2

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type

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20.

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270.

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Edu

catio

n le

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–0.1

50.

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40.

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er0.

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kerk

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04

NO

TE

: IT

= in

timat

e te

rror

ism

; SC

V =

situ

atio

nal c

oupl

e vi

olen

ce.n

= 3

,533

. For

vio

lenc

e ty

pe, 0

=no

nvio

lent

; for

rac

e, 0

=W

hite

.†p

< .1

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.05.

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1.

339



killers. Furthermore, additional post hoc analyses revealed that comparedto victims of situational couple violence, victims of intimate terrorismwere clearly more likely to use painkillers (exp(B) = 3.73, p < .01).

Second, results revealed that the odds that victims of intimate terrorismwould use tranquilizers were more than three times those of women whodid not experience violence, whereas victims of situational couple vio-lence were not at an increased risk (see Table 5). These results held evenafter considering demographic information and scores on the ViolenceScale. Follow-up analyses, however, revealed that the difference in likeli-hood between victims of intimate terrorism and victims of situational cou-ple violence was not statistically different (exp(B) = 1.65, p = .31). More-over, scores on the Violence Scale were not related to tranquilizer use.

Finally, regarding antidepressant use, results indicated that both vic-tims of intimate terrorism and victims of situational couple violence weremore likely than women in nonviolent relationships to use antidepres-sants, even after considering demographic information and scores on theViolence Scale (see Table 6). Similar to the results concerning tranquilizeruse, the likelihood of using antidepressants was not significantly differentfor victims of intimate terrorism and victims of situational couple vio-lence (exp(B) = 1.05, p = .93).

Hypothesis 4: Intimate terrorism interferes more with daily activities than situ-ational couple violence does.

Once again, we are faced with a very conservative test of our hypothe-sis, as questions about missed work were asked only with regard to the im-pact of the most recent incident of violence. Nonetheless, a hierarchicallogistic regression revealed that after considering demographic informa-tion, victims of intimate terrorism were much more likely than victims ofsituational couple violence to have missed work as result of violence (seeTable 7). The effect of violence type became considerably weaker andwas no longer statistically significant when scores on the Violence Scalewere considered, suggesting that level of violence may mediate the impactof intimate terrorism on missing work. The interaction between type of vi-olence and scores on the Violence Scale was not statistically significant(exp(B) = .81, p = .39).

Hypothesis 5: Victims of intimate terrorism are more likely to leave their hus-band and seek help.


(text continues on p. 344)



TA

BL

E 5

Pre

dict

ors

of T

ranq

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se (

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isti

c R

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el 1

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el 2

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el 3

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dict

ors

BSE

exp(

B)

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exp(

B)

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exp(

B)

Con

stan

t–3

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800.

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NO

TE

: IT

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timat

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rror

ism

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situ

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olen

ce.n

= 3

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vio

lenc

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p<

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< .0

1.

341



TA

BL

E 6

Pre

dict

ors

of A

ntid

epre

ssan

t U

se (

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isti

c R

egre

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Mod

el 1

Mod

el 2

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el 3

Pre

dict

ors

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exp(

B)

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exp(

B)

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exp(

B)

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stan

t–3

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0.09

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: IT

= in

timat

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situ

atio

nal c

oupl

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olen

ce.n

= 3

,535

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vio

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=W

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< .1

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p<

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< .0

1.

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TA

BL

E 7

Pre

dict

ors

of R

espo

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ts’M

issi

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ork

Bec

ause

of

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lenc

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ogis

tic

Reg

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Mod

el 1

Mod

el 2

Mod

el 3

Pre

dict

ors

BSE

exp(

B)

BSE

exp(

B)

BSE

exp(

B)

Con

stan

t–2

.73

0.37

0.07

**–2

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1.49

0.08

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1.76

0.01

**V

iole

nce

type

(IT

)1.

090.

482.

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1.14

0.50

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470.

561.

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0.02

0.99

0.01

0.02

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n le

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0.15

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0.25

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–0.0

60.

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0.09

0.99

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eB

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–6.2

117

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0.00

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0.26

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elχ2

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0.05

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TE

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= in

timat

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rror

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.n=

205

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vio

lenc

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pe, 0

=si

tuat

iona

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ple

viol

ence

; for

rac

e, 0

=W

hite

.†p

< .1

0. *

p<

.05.

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< .0

1.

343



Results of a hierarchical OLS regression indicate that experiencing in-timate terrorism was significantly related to the number of times thewoman left the violent partner (see Table 8).

Although the effect of experiencing intimate terrorism decreased whenViolence Scale scores were considered, it remained marginally signifi-cant. The interaction between intimate terrorism and the Violence Scalewas not statistically significant (t = 1.59, p = .11).

Finally, we can ask where women who leave violent relationships seekhelp but, once again, only for the most recent time she left. Table 9 showsthat although friends and relatives are the most common destinations forboth types of victims, victims of intimate terrorism are more likely to ac-quire their own residence (suggesting a consideration of permanent sepa-ration) or to go to locations that are safe, either because of security (safehouses) or perhaps secrecy (hotels). Overall, these data provide reasonablesupport for Hypothesis 5.

CONCLUSION

The general pattern of the data presented above is clear. The conse-quences for women who experience intimate terrorism are different fromthose for women who experience situational couple violence. Womensubjected to intimate terrorism are attacked more frequently and experi-ence violence that is less likely to stop. They are more likely to be injured,to exhibit more of the symptoms of posttraumatic stress syndrome, to usepainkillers (perhaps also tranquilizers and antidepressants), and to misswork. Furthermore, they are more likely to leave their husbands, leavethem more often, and, when they leave, to seek their own residence orescape to locations that ensure safety.

These findings are not surprising once the distinction between violenceembedded in general control over one’s partner (intimate terrorism) andviolence that erupts in response to more specific forms of conflict (situa-tional couple violence) is made and understood. The partner violence lit-erature, however, consists primarily of studies that make no such distinc-tions. When a sample (often from survey research) includes primarilysituational couple violence mixed with substantially fewer cases of inti-mate terrorism, the consequences of the violence may not appear to beparticularly dramatic. One might be puzzled, for example, by how fewwomen report leaving their batterers. This finding, however, reflects ageneral problem with this type of sample; there may actually be very fewbatterers among the violent men.




TA

BL

E 8

Pre

dict

ors

of N

umbe

r of

Tim

es R

espo

nden

t L

eft

Her

Par

tner

(O

LS

Reg

ress

ion)

Mod

el 1

Mod

el 2

Mod

el 3

Pre

dict

ors

bβ

tb

βt

bβ

t

Con

stan

t0.

412.

29*

2.05

2.35

*0.

210.

22V

iole

nce

type

(IT

)0.

960.

223.

21**

0.90

0.21

2.96

**0.

58–0

.13

1.94

†A

ge–0

.01

–0.0

5–0

.71

–0.0

00.

00–0

.05

Edu

catio

n le

vel

–0.1

9–0

.10

–1.3

9–0

.07

–0.0

4–0

.52

Inco

me

–0.0

4–0

.05

–0.7

3–0

.02

–0.0

2–0

.30

Rac

eB

lack

–0.8

0–0

.09

–1.2

9–0

.54

–0.0

6–0

.91

Oth

er–0

.49

–0.0

7–1

.06

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1–0

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–0.2

5V

iole

nce

scal

e0.

300.

304.

18**

R2

0.05

0.08

0.15

F10

.28*

*2.

66*

4.97

**∆

F1.

1317

.47*

*

NO

TE

: OL

S =

Ord

inar

y L

east

Squ

ares

; IT

= in

timat

e te

rror

ism

.n=

205

. For

vio

lenc

e ty

pe, 0

=si

tuat

iona

l cou

ple

viol

ence

; for

rac

e, 0

=W

hite

.†p

< .1

0. *

p<

.05.

**p

< .0

1.

345



Even in the current analysis, in which our criterion for defining inti-mate terrorism is a relatively low level of control, for victims of intimateterrorism, the odds of being injured are double those for victims of situa-tional couple violence. Likewise, they score higher on a measure of post-traumatic stress symptomology and leave their husbands more often. Tograsp the nature of abuse from survey data rather than from shelters, hos-pitals, and the courts, it is crucial that we make these distinctions amongtypes of violence. This simple yet significant step will keep us from mak-ing generalizations about abuse from data consisting of partner violencethat may not meet commonly accepted definitions of abuse.

Just as intimate terrorism and situational couple violence have differ-ent outcomes, they probably have different causes and remedies. Only re-search that attends to these differences can effectively inform social pol-icy, educational efforts, and intervention strategies. For example, becausewomen subjected to intimate terrorism are more likely to suffer psycho-logically, sustain injuries, and miss work, they are at an increased risk ofbeing unable to achieve and maintain self-sufficiency (Leone, Johnson,Cohan, & Lloyd, 2004). Thus, social policies that temporarily or perma-nently restrict a woman’s income (such as time limits on receipt of tempo-rary aid to needy families) may be especially detrimental to women en-trapped in intimate terrorism because they are already at risk for beingunable to secure self-sufficiency. These are the very women who are mostlikely trying to escape from their partner, and social policy needs tocontribute to their self-sufficiency, not undermine it.


TABLE 9Where Respondent Stayed by Violence Type

Violence Type

Intimate SituationalTerrorism Couple Violence

Where Respondent Stayed % n % n

Relative’s house 40 12 70 21With a friend 10 3 23 7Safe house, hotel or motel, got own place 37 11 3 1He left and she stayed, homeless shelter, other 13 4 3 1

χ2 = 17.06. df = 3. p < .01.



In the realm of prevention, educational programs commonly treat part-ner violence as a unitary phenomenon, referring to it as abuse or battering.In these situations, prevalence statistics that describe abuse are oftendrawn from survey data that include large numbers of incidents of situa-tional couple violence. The numbers, therefore, greatly exaggerate theprevalence of abuse. Speakers who claim that 50% of American wives ex-perience battering at some point in their marriage undermine their owncredibility. We need to provide statistics that are appropriately focused onintimate terrorism. Educational programs that distinguish between typesof violence will be better able to present information in the appropriatecontext, without misrepresenting the nature or prevalence of either intimateterrorism or situational couple violence.

In the realm of direct intervention, programs that do not make distinc-tions may inadvertently do a disservice to some women. For example, ininitial client contacts, shelter personnel typically focus on the pattern ofpower and control involved in intimate terrorism. Women who have expe-rienced situational couple violence that does not fit this pattern may thenbe less likely to identify their relationship as problematic and may there-fore choose not to access services that might have been helpful to them.Screening instruments that adequately distinguish between types of vio-lence can help practitioners to identify the underlying nature of the prob-lem and to recommend appropriate interventions. For example, it is com-mon for couples involved in violence to be referred to couples counselingor mediation, a strategy that can be extremely dangerous for women en-trapped in intimate terrorism, who risk retaliation if they disclose infor-mation about the abuse in front of the abuser. In this situation, couplescounseling would be not only inappropriate but dangerous. For couplesinvolved in situational couple violence, however, such counseling mightprovide useful skills in problem solving, anger management, and conflictresolution.

In general, the current study demonstrates that research on partner vio-lence can be more effective by distinguishing between types of violence.We have shown that situational couple violence and intimate terrorism canbe identified and analyzed separately in survey data and that they have dif-ferent effects on their victims. M. P. Johnson (1999) has shown that bothtypes also can be found in data gathered from agency populations. Thus, itis crucial that researchers make these distinctions in their research and ad-equately define the nature of the violence they study. We have demon-strated that intimate terrorism and situational couple violence are not thesame phenomenon. Scientific research that fails to make this distinction




risks making inaccurate and potentially dangerous overgeneralizationsabout partner violence.

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Documents

The Differential Effects of Intimate Terrorism and Situational Couple Violence: Findings From the National Violence Against Women Survey