Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones, But Abusive Text Messages Also Hurt

Abstract

Psychological abuse between intimate partners is common and is an important area of inquiry. The present study sought to develop and validate the Cyber Psychological Abuse (CPA) scale to assess psychological abuse during arguments between romantic partners using cell phones, e-mail, computers, and through social networking sites. A sample of 271 undergraduate students who were currently in romantic relationships completed a series of measures in an online survey. Results indicated a 2-factor structure of the CPA scale (minor and severe cyber abuse). Cyber psychological abuse was very common with 93% of college students perpetrating and being victimized by minor cyber abuse (e.g., swearing, insulting, or "shouting" with capital letters) during arguments in their current romantic relationships. Severe cyber psychological abuse (e.g., threats or public humiliation) was less common with 12%-13% of college students reporting such abuse. No gender differences were found for minor cyber abuse, but males were more likely to report being victimized by severe cyber abuse than females. The CPA's victimization and perpetration scales showed an expected pattern of associations with previously validated abuse and aggression measures as well as with perceived stress levels. Minor cyber abuse on the CPA scale predicted levels of perceived stress over and above physical abuse. The results of the current study provide a preliminary demonstration of the validity of the CPA scale, which appears to be an internally consistent and valid measure for capturing psychological partner abuse as it occurs in an electronic context.

Abuso, Control Y Violencia en La Pareja a Través De Internet Y Los Smartphones: Características, Evaluación Y Prevención

“…Las conductas de control o vigilancia a la pareja o expareja a través de medios electrónicos han sido los comportamientos que mayor interés han generado (Brown y Hegarty, 2018;Leisring y Giumetti, 2014). Zweig et al (2013) encontraron que herramientas como el email, los teléfonos móviles, e incluso equipos como los GPS o las webcams, eran utilizados para llevar a cabo conductas de control en la pareja (p.ej., envío exce-sivo de e-mails, comprobación de llamadas y/o cuentas de correo electrónico o utilización de GPS, spyware, webcams y/o contraseñas personales para controlar a la pareja).…”

“…En otras palabras, la víctima suele ser también agresor, y el agresor tiende a convertirse en víctima. Estos resultados han sido también informados para el abuso online (Leisring y Giumetti, 2014;Reed et al, 2017).…”

Insecure Attachment, Maladaptive Personality Traits, and the Perpetration of In-Person and Cyber Psychological Abuse

“…relationship. CPA scores have demonstrated good convergent validity in terms of associations with psychometrically sound measures of in-person psychological abuse and IPV, and a measure of Facebook arguing(Leisring & Giumetti, 2014). There was acceptable reliability (α = .79) for the perpetration subscale.…”

Cyber Dating Abuse and Masculine Gender Norms in a Sample of Male Adults

“…In line with former research, ICT like smartphones (text messages, messenger services), websites of social networks (Facebook, Twitter), and telephone applications (Instagram, Snapchat), facilitate constant communication between partners [4], but can also be used as a means to directly exercise aggression and to control partners or former partners [5]. Although various terms can be used to name this phenomenon, such as "electronic dating violence" [6], "digital forms of dating violence" [7], "intimate partner cyber harassment" [8], "cyber partner abuse" [9], "cyber psychological abuse" [10], the term most widely used by the scientific community is "cyber dating abuse" [11,12].…”