Children Exposed to Intimate Partner Violence from Fragile Families: The Moderating Role of Social Support

Abstract

Intimate partner violence (IPV) from male to female is prevalent among the US population, alongside extensive studies showing the negative associations between maternal IPV victimization and child’s developmental outcomes. Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, we endeavored to examine the consequences of exposure to maternal IPV on child’s internalizing functioning, as well as the moderating effect of mother’s perceived social support in this current study. We employed both cross-sectional and longitudinal modeling strategies and found that 1) approximately one in four mothers had experienced emotional violence from their intimate partners at least once, and over 10% mothers had encountered physical or sexual violence; 2) There were significant adverse maternal IPV victimization effects from both cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses and 3) the mother’s perceived social support played a moderating role in buffering the impact of IPV exposure on children’s internalizing functioning under a physical or sexual violence setting, although the effect was not robust using more rigorous longitudinal analysis. An intensive intervention facilitating mother’s social support was thus suggested to protect children under such risks.