BARNETT, Ola W., Cindy L. MILLER-PERRIN, Robin D. PERRIN, Family Violence Across The lifespan: An Introduction

Abstract

BARNETT, Ola W., Cindy L. MILLER-PERRIN, Robin D. PERRIN, Across The lifespan : An Introduction. Thousand Oaks,CA : Sage Publications, Inc., 1997, 392 pp., $73.50 hardcover. Family Violence encompasses a wide variety of types of relationship abuses within the family structure. This text presents a comprehensive collection of up-to-date research on the subjects of child abuse, dating violence, marital violence, and elder-abuse. Not only are the data pertaining to the topics concisely presented, but the authors explain methodological problems with current research and suggest methods for collecting more useful data in the future. Barnett, Miller-Perrin, and Perrin employ a Social Constructionist framework to describe the various types of family violence. This perspective presents a view of the development of the social issue of each type of family violence from a social condition to the point where it becomes a social problem. They take a multidisciplinary, multilevel approach to the presentation of theories of family violence, and discuss the methodological issues inherent in investigating each type of abuse. The chapters in this text deal with types of violence from birth to death. Most chapters begin with an interview with an expert in the specific type of intimate violence. Chapters then go on to describe the characteristics of victims and perpetrators, the theories that explain the abuse, and types of interventions to help victims and perpetrators. Inserted throughout are case histories, short articles on special facets of each type of abuse, and intermediate summaries of the material covered. Regarding the latter, because the summaries at the end of chapters are so comprehensive, the flow of the material would be smoother if the intermediate summaries within the chapters were eliminated. The first two chapters include an outline of the history of the development of family violence from a social fact to a social problem, describe the myths surrounding family violence, point out the lack of a consensus on a single definition of family violence, describe the main theories to explain domestic violence, and illustrate how researchers investigate family violence. Of particular importance to the beginning researcher in this field is the conclusion of chapter two which explains how data have been collected and the inherent problems and issues involved in collecting such sensitive material. Chapters three, four, and five detail information about child physical and sexual abuse as well as neglect and psychological abuse. Authors make the point that the definition of abuse of children has been problematic because of society's acceptance of a certain amount of controlling, coercive behavior thought necessary to shape children appropriately. Chapter six is unique because it identifies as psychological abuse the experience of children who are exposed to marital violence, and discusses the problems surrounding research in this area. Children exposed to family violence are likely to experience various emotional traumas, negative cognitive effects, behavioral problems and health consequences, but this source of abuse has yet to be recognized by the public as a social problem. Chapter seven deals with a relatively new area of intimate violence, date violence and rape. The fact that female high school students have a 15.5% lifetime prevalence rate of courtship violence and male high school students have a 7.8% rate (Barnett, Miller-Perrin, and Perrin: 165) is evidence that intimate violence is not only caused by stresses inherent in marital relationships, thus analysis must include more complex factors in explaining this abusive behavior. Chapters eight, nine and ten cover the problem of marital violence, in general, and more specific information about battered women and batterers. One section within chapter eight, Monetary Costs of Marital Violence, claims welfare costs as another cost of domestic violence, but fails to expand on this point. …