Physical and Emotional Abuse in Romantic Relationships: Motivation for Perpetration Among College Women

Intimate partner violence is extremely common in college samples. To inform prevention and intervention efforts, understanding the motivation for engaging in partner aggression is critically important. The predominant view in the domestic violence field has been that women's use of intimate partner violence occurs in the context of self-defense. However, there has been a dearth of solid evidence to support this claim. The present study explored the motivations for the perpetration of minor and severe physical aggression and for three types of emotional abuse (restrictive engulfment, denigration, and dominance/intimidation) among college women. A detailed definition of self-defense was used and motivations for women who were sole perpetrators of physical violence as well as motivations for women who had been aggressed against in their romantic relationships were examined. Anger, retaliation for emotional hurt, to get partner's attention, jealousy, and stress were all common reasons for perpetrating partner violence among college women. Few women indicated that self-defense was a motive for their abusive behavior. The results suggest that prevention and intervention efforts to reduce partner violence perpetration by women should include anger and stress management.