This article provides a review of research literature on women who use violence with intimate partners. The central purpose is to inform service providers in the military and civilian communities who work with domestically violent women. The major points of this review are as follows: (a) women's violence usually occurs in the context of violence against them by their male partners; (b) in general, women and men perpetrate equivalent levels of physical and psychological aggression, but evidence suggests that men perpetrate sexual abuse, coercive control, and stalking more frequently than women and that women also are much more frequently injured during domestic violence incidents; (c) women and men are equally likely to initiate physical violence in relationships involving less serious "situational couple violence," and in relationships in which serious and very violent "intimate terrorism" occurs, men are much more likely to be perpetrators and women victims; (d) women's physical violence is more likely than men's violence to be motivated by self-defense and fear, whereas men's physical violence is more likely than women's to be driven by control motives; (e) studies of couples in mutually violent relationships find more negative effects for women than for men; and (f) because of the many differences in behaviors and motivations between women's and men's violence, interventions based on male models of partner violence are likely not effective for many women.

Extant literature provides support for emotion dysregulation as a transdiagnostic construct with relevance to the pathogenesis and treatment of numerous psychiatric difficulties and maladaptive behaviors, including risky, self-destructive, and health-compromising behaviors (e.g., substance use, risky sexual behavior). The aim of the present review is to synthesize theory and empirical research on the relationship between emotion dysregulation and risky behaviors. In addition, we highlight cutting-edge approaches for investigating the emotion dysregulation-risky behavior, including examination of the role of positive emotional experiences and inclusion of context-dependent and physiological assessments. Finally, we note the relevance of the emotion dysregulation-risky behavior relation to intervention efforts aimed at reducing risky behaviors.

This study examines motives for intimate partner violence (IPV) among a community sample of 412 women who used IPV against male partners. A "Motives and Reasons for IPV scale" is proposed, and exploratory factor analyses identified five factors: expression of negative emotions, self-defense, control, jealousy, and tough guise. To our knowledge, the study is the first to investigate the relationship between women's motives for IPV and their perpetration of physical, psychological, and sexual aggression, as well as coercive control, toward partners. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed participants' aggression was driven by complex, multiple motives. All five motives were related to a greater frequency of perpetrating IPV. Treatment programs focusing on women's IPV perpetration should address both defensive and proactive motives. KeywordsIntimate partner violence; motives; female perpetrators; Motives and Reasons for Intimate Partner Violence scale Increased rates of arrests of women for domestic violence offenses (Kernsmith, 2005;Swan & Snow, 2002) highlight the importance of understanding the reasons that women, as well as men, use intimate partner violence (IPV) . To develop effective interventions, researchers and service providers working with individuals who use IPV need to understand what the individuals themselves see as their reasons for committing aggressive behaviors. However, knowledge of these reasons for IPV, particularly for women, is hampered by a lack of empirical data (Hettrich & O'Leary, 2007;. The purpose of this study is to examine reasons and motives for IPV among a community sample of women who used IPV against male intimate partners. A "Motives and Reasons for IPV scale" is proposed, and exploratory factor analyses are conducted to identify the factor structure of the scale. The relationships between scale factors and women's IPV is examined, controlling for victimization the women received from their partners. The study is the first, to our knowledge, to investigate the relationship between a comprehensive measure of women's reasons and motives for IPV and their perpetration of physical, psychological, and sexual aggression, as well as coercive control, toward their partners. Women's Motives for Intimate Partner ViolenceMotives are defined as "underlying psychological processes that impel people's thinking, feeling, and behaving" (Fiske, 2004, p. 14). Motives for aggressive behavior in general have been conceptualized as reactive (responding to a perceived threat, such as defending oneself when attacked) versus proactive (aggression that is initiated with the goal of dominating, controlling, threatening, or bullying someone else) (Dodge & Coie, 1987). Similarly, women's motivations for aggression against intimate partners have been organized into two types: defensive or reactive motives (i.e., self-protective violence) and active motives, or those that go beyond simply defending oneself and are goal-oriented, such as anger, retaliation, and attempts to control the partner (Sw...

Posttraumatic stress disorder resulting from intimate partner violence (IPV-related PTSD), drug problems, and alcohol problems were tested as correlates of women's sexual risk behavior. Participants were 136 low-income women experiencing physical violence by a male partner during the past 6 months. Sexual risk behavior was assessed by whether women had unprotected sex with a risky primary partner (i.e., HIV-positive, injection drug user, and/or nonmonogamous), unprotected sex with a risky nonprimary partner (i.e. HIV-positive or unknown status), or traded sex during the past 6 months. Nearly one in five women engaged in these recent sexual risk behaviors. Simultaneous logistic regression results revealed IPV-related PTSD, but not drug or alcohol problems, was significantly associated with sexual risk behavior while controlling for childhood abuse and demographic covariates. Women with IPV-related PTSD had four times greater odds of recent sexual risk behavior compared to women without IPV-related PTSD. Implications for HIV prevention interventions are discussed.

Path modeling assessed (a) the influence of child abuse traumatization on women's use of violence and their experiences of being victimized, (b) the association of these three variables to depressive and posttraumatic stress symptoms, and (c) the indirect pathways from women using violence and their being victimized to psychological symptoms through avoidance coping. Among 108 primarily African American women recruited from the community who used violence with a male partner, women's use of violence, but not their experiences of being victimized, was predicted by child abuse traumatization. Women's use of violence did not directly or indirectly predict symptomatology. In contrast, child abuse traumatization and women's experiences of being victimized were predictive of both depressive and posttraumatic stress symptoms, and being victimized also was related indirectly to depressive symptoms through avoidance coping.

Background Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among inpatients with substance use disorders (SUDs) is associated with heightened engagement in a variety of risky, self-destructive, and health-compromising behaviors (e.g., risky sexual behavior, aggression). Extant research provides support for the role of emotion dysregulation in the PTSD-risky behavior relation among inpatients with SUD; however, this research has been limited by a focus on emotion dysregulation involving negative (versus positive) emotions. The goal of the current study was to extend past research on the PTSD-risky behavior relation by examining the potential mediating roles of negative and positive urgency (two domains of emotion dysregulation defined by the tendency to engage in risky behavior in the context of negative and positive emotions, respectively). Methods Participants were 158 trauma-exposed inpatients with (n = 91) and without (n = 67) lifetime PTSD consecutively admitted to a residential SUD treatment facility (M age = 34.34; 59.5% White, 50.6% female). Patients were administered diagnostic interviews and completed self-report questionnaires. Results Significant positive associations were found among lifetime PTSD symptoms, negative and positive urgency, and risky behaviors. Moreover, findings revealed significant indirect effects of lifetime PTSD symptoms on risky behaviors through the pathways of both negative and positive urgency. Conclusions Results provide initial support for the mediating roles of both negative and positive urgency in the PTSD-risky behavior relation, highlighting the potential utility of teaching trauma-exposed inpatients with PTSD-SUD skills for tolerating negative and positive emotional states without engaging in maladaptive behaviors.

Latent class analysis was used to examine patterns of victimization among a community sample of 212 women experiencing intimate partner violence (IPV). Results identified three classes of women characterized by victimization history (recent IPV, childhood victimization); classes were further differentiated by IPV-related PTSD symptoms, other indicators of psychological distress, and substance use. Differentiating levels of victimization and their associated patterns of psychosocial functioning can be used to develop intervention strategies targeting the needs of different subgroups of women so that mental health and substance use problems can be reduced or prevented altogether. Implications for treatment and future research are presented.

Women who experience intimate partner violence (IPV) have higher rates of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and substance abuse compared to women who do not experience IPV. However, the extent to which IPV-related PTSD symptoms are related to women's substance use involvement largely has been unexplored. The current study investigated PTSD symptomatology and substance use in a community sample of 212 IPV-exposed women. Drug-using women reported higher PTSD severity scores compared to women who reported no substance use or alcohol use only. Moreover, the reexperiencing, avoidance and numbing, and arousal clusters demonstrated unique associations with substance use involvement. Findings not only elucidate the associations among IPV-related PTSD symptoms and substance use, but they also can inform community-based preventive interventions.Although our understanding of trauma, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and its negative sequelae has become considerably advanced over the last 25 years, research has often fallen prey to the "fiction of homogeneity," or the assumption that different traumatic events pose equal risk for the development of PTSD symptoms and other psychological problems (Ozer, Best, Lipsey, & Weiss, 2003, p. 68). In fact, Ozer and colleagues' meta-analysis documented that the type of referent traumatic event had predictive utility, in that interpersonal traumatic events demonstrated the strongest relationships to the development of PTSD. One source of interpersonal trauma that has received limited attention in the literature on PTSD is intimate partner violence (IPV). This is of concern, as IPV-exposed women are 2.9-5.9 times more likely to develop PTSD and 5.6 times more likely to abuse or be dependent on alcohol or drugs compared to women who have not experienced IPV (Golding, 1999). Given the considerable overlap between IPV exposure, PTSD, and substance use disorders, in the current study we sought to further elucidate the associations between PTSD and substance use by first documenting the prevalence of IPV-related PTSD symptoms in a community sample of IPVexposed women, and second, examining associations among women's level of substance use involvement and the extent to which they endorsed symptoms in each of the three PTSD symptom clusters (i.e., reexperiencing, avoidance and numbing, and arousal).Although few studies have examined IPV-related PTSD, there is a well-developed body of literature linking IPV-exposure and PTSD with substance use and abuse. Numerous studies have shown that there are strong associations between IPV exposure and substance use (Burke, Thieman, Gielen, O'Campo, & McDonnell, 2005;Coker et al., 2002; ElBassel, Gilbert, Wu, Go, & Hill, 2005;Kilpatrick, Acierno, Resnick, Saunders, & Best, 1997). Regarding the relationship between PTSD and substance use disorders, the National Comorbidity Study showed that women with PTSD were 2.48 times more likely to have a diagnosis of alcohol abuse or dependence and 4.46 times more likely to have a diagnosis of drug ab...