Intimate Partner Violence Survivors’ Reports of Their Children’s Exposure to Companion Animal Maltreatment: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Children living in households where intimate partner violence (IPV) is present are at increased risk of being exposed to concomitant maltreatment of companion animals. Recent research suggests that childhood exposure to maltreatment of companion animals is associated with compromised socioemotional well-being in childhood and adulthood. To date, there is a dearth of qualitative research examining how children experience animal maltreatment in the context of IPV. The current qualitative study explored the following research question in an ethnically diverse sample of IPV survivors: How do maternal caregivers convey the ways in which their children experience animal maltreatment in IPV-affected households? Sixty-five women with at least one child (age 7–12 years) were recruited from domestic violence agencies and described their child(ren)’s experiences of animal maltreatment in the home. Template analysis was used to analyze interview data (KALPHA = .90). Three themes emerged related to children’s experiences of animal maltreatment: (a) direct exposure to animal maltreatment and related threats, (b) emotional and behavioral responses to animal maltreatment exposure, and (c) animal maltreatment as coercive control of the child. Results suggest that children’s exposure to animal maltreatment is multifaceted and may exacerbate children’s risk of negative psychosocial outcomes in the context of co-occurring IPV. Intervention programs designed to assist children exposed to IPV should consider the extent of children’s awareness of the abuse of their pets and their strong and deleterious reactions to it.

The relations among animal abuse, psychological disorders, and crime: Implications for forensic assessment

“…We note that the developing field of behavioral epigenetics lends support to the associations among CD, CU traits, DNA methylation (Cecil et al, ; Dadds et al, ), and levels of serotonin (Moul, Dobson‐Stone, Brennan, Hawes, & Dadds, ). Our own research supports associations among exposure to animal abuse, CU traits, and children's internalizing and externalizing behavior problems (McDonald, Graham‐Bermann, Maternick, Ascione, & Williams, ; McDonald, Collins, et al, ).…”

“…Gelhorn, Sakai, Price, and Crowley () examined AA in the context of CD and antisocial personality disorder (APD) in a large ( N = 41,571) nationally representative sample of adults, finding that for men self‐reports of AA were associated with both CD and APD. The recently included LPE specifier (DSM‐5, 2013) may prove to be valuable in studies of AA (Kahn, Frick, Youngstrom, Findling, & Youngstrom, ; Klahr & Burt, ; Longman, Hawes, & Kohlhoff, ; Scheepers, Buitelaar, & Matthys, ; Walters, , ), especially since deficits in empathy and CU traits may be implicated in some cases of AA (McDonald, Collins, et al, ; Plant, van Schaik, Gullone, & Flynn, ). We note that the developing field of behavioral epigenetics lends support to the associations among CD, CU traits, DNA methylation (Cecil et al, ; Dadds et al, ), and levels of serotonin (Moul, Dobson‐Stone, Brennan, Hawes, & Dadds, ).…”

“…A review of the results of this project thus far are summarized by McDonald (), and include identifying the mediational role of CU traits in the association between childhood AA exposure and externalizing behaviors. Moreover, we have found that children (and their victimized caregivers) distinguish between multiple forms of AA, including AA as a tactic of coercive control against their parent/siblings, AA meant to punish animals for misbehavior, and callous abuse/torturing of pets (McDonald et al, ; McDonald et al, ; McDonald, Cody, et al, ; McDonald, Collins, et al, ; McDonald, Dmitrieva, et al, ). A notable finding from this study is that many children were physically and emotionally victimized as a result of protecting a pet during incidents of AA perpetrated by an abusive caregiver, which may exacerbate their risk for serious injury and maladjustment.…”

Concomitant Exposure to Animal Maltreatment and Socioemotional Adjustment among Children Exposed to Intimate Partner Violence: a Mixed Methods Study

“…Findings from recent qualitative studies (e.g., Collins et al 2017;McDonald et al 2015McDonald et al , 2017 suggest that the type of maltreatment that children are exposed to, the motivations they attribute to the violence, and their emotional and behavioral reactions to AM, may have important implications for understanding the link between AM exposure and children's socioemotional adjustment within the context of violent families. In particular, recent studies of pet-owning women and children recruited from community-based IPV services reported that children are often directly exposed to AM perpetrated by a caregiver/ parent that is aimed to: (a) coerce and force the compliance of an intimate partner (McDonald et al 2015(McDonald et al , 2017, (b) punish the pet for misbehavior (McDonald et al 2015(McDonald et al , 2017, and/or (c) coerce or punish the child (McDonald et al 2017). Moreover, these recent studies suggest that a child's emotional and behavioral responses to AM impact how they experience and cope with such events (McDonald et al 2015(McDonald et al , 2016.…”

“I Wouldn’t Be Here Without Them”: Resilience in Youth Exposed to Intimate Partner Violence

“…To date, very little qualitative research has sought to hear the voices of young persons exposed to IPV, particularly concerning their strengths and positive coping mechanisms. Most published research has collected information on this topic from proxies, typically mothers of young persons exposed to IPV, by asking them to describe the lived experiences and coping strategies of their children (Bourassa, Letourneau, Holden, & Turcotte, 2017;Fogarty et al, 2019;Louis & Johnson, 2017;McDonald et al, 2019), while other studies have interviewed adults who were exposed to IPV as children to retrospectively investigate their early experiences (Haselschwerdt, Maddox, & Hlavaty, 2019;Humphreys, 2001aHumphreys, , 2001bNaughton, O'Donnell, & Muldoon, 2019;O'Brien, Cohen, Pooley, & Taylor, 2013;Suzuki, Geffner, & Bucky, 2008). Relying solely on maternal reports of their children's experiences is problematic due to the potential bias of these reports, which tend to provide a more negative portrait of children's adjustment, likely due to the distress and PTSD symptoms that women often experience following IPV (Chan & Yeung, 2009;Sternberg, Baradaran, Abbott, Lamb, & Guterman, 2006).…”