Indiana University psychologist Amy Holtzworth-Munroe says that 25% of all U.S. high school students and 33% of all college students have been involved in a violent dating relationship at some point in their lives, either as victim or perpetrator1. Such violence can range from occasional slapping or shoving to life-threatening beatings.
"A lot of people unfortunately accept or assume some level of violence in their relationships," she says.
Once a person finds himself or herself in a violent relationship, Holtzworth-Munroe says that there's no way of predicting if the violent partner will become increasingly dangerous in the future or not. Any level of violence must be dealt with as soon as it happens.
Holtzworth-Munroe is conducting research to determine why some men become violent in relationships while most others do not. Her research shows that men who abuse their wives and girlfriends lack the social skills necessary to function in a relationship.
She says that some violent men can't think of rational ways of dealing with relationship conflict and will resort to violence by default. Other men may be able to think of competent ways of dealing with the situation, but they choose violence because they think it will be the quickest or most efficient way of getting what they want.
In addition to his or her reasoning problems, a batterer is suspicious and will often misinterpret his/her partner's behavior, seeing it in an unrealistically negative light. At the same time, batterers tend to be dependent on and preoccupied with their relationships.
Batterers are particularly upset by any suggestion, real or imagined, that their partners are rejecting them or are going to leave them.
"If the wife does something annoying or upsetting, even if most rational people would see that it was an accident, a violent husband will think that she's done it with hostile intent," says Holtzworth-Munroe. "And then he justifies his violent behavior by thinking, 'She purposely tried to hurt me, so it's all right if I retaliate.'"
One of Holtzworth-Munroe's research projects is a closer examination of her finding that violent men lack social skills. She believes that educational programs of anger management and communication skills development could help violent people change their reactions and behaviors (provided they genuinely want to change, of course).
1: iandunn has challenged the accuracy of the above domestic violence figures and referred me to http://shethinks.org/articles/an00029.cfm for what he believes are more accurate figures. I don't know that I find that site's information to be any less biased than iandunn claims Holtzworth-Munroe's statistics are, but there it is. This node contains the information a recognized domestic violence researcher gave me as a direct quote at the time I wrote the piece.
FWIW, her figures did not strike me (no pun intended) as being overly high. Maybe that's because I grew up in Texas.
Wry jokes aside, domestic violence is a complicated issue. I've known both men and women who have been physically, sexually, and emotionally abused by their dates and lovers.
I don't for one minute think men are inherently more abusive than women. However, because men are generally bigger and stronger, and in some cultures raised to believe violence is an appropriate response to trivial slights, they can and do cause more physical damage. I've seen men who've been slapped by angry girlfriends and everyone involved pretty much just blows it off afterward; I think such seemingly-inconsequential violence needs to be addressed, because it's a sign of an unhealthy relationship even if it never escalates to someone "really" getting hurt.
And, of course, we're not talking about BDSM play within a relationship, which is dandy as long as it's kept safe, sane, and consensual.