Child Maltreatment History and Interpersonal Problems in Adult Couple Relationships

Abstract

This study examines the relationship between interpersonal problems in adult couple relationships and childhood maltreatment in a sample of 1,728 university students who completed an online questionnaire. Victims of maltreatment reported higher levels of couple interpersonal problems. Also, the experience of childhood maltreatment is more strongly associated with couple interpersonal difficulties for males than for females. For females, emotional neglect is more consistently related to couple interpersonal problems, including problems with being nonassertive, distant, and self-sacrificing. For males, physical abuse is significantly associated with the likelihood of being domineering, distant, and self-sacrificing. The issue of how the different forms of maltreatment might contribute differently to couple interpersonal problems for males and females is addressed and discussed.

A Developmental Process Analysis of the Contribution of Childhood Emotional Abuse to Relationship Violence

“…Although some research suggests that victims of childhood emotional abuse experience more difficulty and dissatisfaction in their adult intimate relationships (Dodge Reyome, 2010;Messman-Moore & Coates, 2007;Mullen et al, 1996;Paradis & Boucher, 2010;Perry, DiLillo, & Peugh, 2007;Varia, Abidin, & Dass, 1996), little is known about the developmental processes underlying such effects. Further, only a few studies have identified relationship violence as a specific outcome of childhood emotional abuse (Bender, Cook, & Kaslow, 2003;Crawford & Wright, 2007;Dodge Reyome, 2010;Simonelli, Mullis, Elliott, & Pierce, 2002;Wekerle et al, 2009;Zurbriggen, Gobin, & Freyd, 2010), whereas others have argued that relationship violence is a product of cooccurring maltreatment subtypes (i.e., emotional and physical abuse together; Paterson, Fairbairn-Dunlop, Cowley-Malcolm, & Schluter, 2007;Wekerle et al, 2001).…”

“…Initially overlooked in the field of child maltreatment research, childhood emotional abuse has shown itself to be an especially pernicious influence on development, with predictive power surpassing physical and sexual abuse across varied outcomes, including psychopathology, subjective distress, interpersonal functioning, and destructive behavior (Briere & Runtz, 1988;Dodge Reyome, 2010;Gross & Keller, 1992;Hart, Binggeli, & Brassard, 1997;Kent, Waller, & Dagnan, 1999;McGee, Wolfe, & Wilson, 1997;Paradis & Boucher, 2010;Spertus, Yehuda, Wong, Halligan, & Seremetis, 2003;Vissing, Straus, Gelles, & Harrop, 1991). Characterized by rejecting, degrading, threatening, isolating, or exploiting caregiving (Hart et al, 1997), emotional abuse can occur in isolation, but also frequently accompanies other types of abuse, making it the most common type of maltreatment (Briere & Runtz, 1990;Claussen & Crittenden, 1991).…”

Identity and relatedness as mediators between child emotional abuse and adult couple adjustment in women

“…Riggs et al (2011) also observed that CEA is associated with poor relationship adjustment through anxious and avoidant attachment in a sample of heterosexual college student couples. Similarly, Paradis and Boucher (2010) revealed that survivors of CEA report greater interpersonal difficulties in their couple relationships than non-victims. For example, survivors reported being more cold or distant with their partner, trying to please their partner too much, being too aggressive toward their partner or not being assertive enough.…”

Family-of-origin violence and college men’s reports of intimate partner violence perpetration in adolescence and young adulthood: The role of maladaptive interpersonal patterns.

“…Although research examining the association between fatnily-of-origin violence and interpersonal problems is limited, among samples of undergraduate students, victims of childhood physical and emotional abuse, and individuals exposed to interparental violence were significantly more likely to report interpersonal problems (Blumenthal, Neemann, & Murphy, 1998;Paradis & Boucher, 2010). Furthermore, interpersonal problems, specifically hostile dominant interpersonal problems (HDIP), may manifest into physical, psychological, and/or sexual aggression toward an intimate partner (Lawson & Malnar, 2011) as a way of achieving/maintaining desired levels of comfort and intimacy within a relationship.…”