Violent physical behavior incidents were collected from a sample of 81 out-patient mental health charts from 1972-1992, the purpose of which was to determine if an association existed between violent behaviors in intact biological families and intact stepfamilies. A chi square test $\chi\sp2$ = 1.89 with a significance level of.388 showed no difference in the incidence of violent behavior in biological and stepfamilies. Biological families accounted for a larger percentage of violent behaviors (63.2%) and total number of current perpetrators (44%) than stepfamilies (36.8%) and current stepfamily perpetrators (26%). Victims were overwhelmingly children (89.5%) clustering between the ages of 9-18 (84.2%). Of these, 63% were male and 37% were female. Slapping accounted for the most prevalent and repeatedly reoccuring type of violent behavior (80%) perpetrated of all violent behaviors across all ages and in both family types.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UMASS/oai:scholarworks.umass.edu:dissertations-8203 |
| Date | 01 January 1993 |
| Creators | Pursley, Victoria V |
| Publisher | ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst |
| Source Sets | University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest |
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