Violence against Men as Moderated by Couple’s Self-Control Configurations

Abstract

In this paper we adhere to the view that the boundaries between common couple or situational violence and criminal act in the sense of the legal definition of the domestic violence are not totally sharp. The key thesis of general theory of crime (Gottfredson, 2005) about the importance of self-control we can develop so that the reasonable selfcontrol can act as a protective factor on the side of the men as victims of intimate partner violence. Our question is whether the individual characteristics of both actors do not create specific composition (configuration), which operates in the form of conflicts, or may encourage the emergence of IPV. For good reasons, however, we think more about the mediation role of these self-control configurations. We can justify it by the assumption that higher self-control in the case of men can support the state in which the victim is overestimating his own potential and manifested even patronizing attitude towards the offender. Our 5 item typology reconstructed for a representative sample of Czech men (N = 1001) demonstrates some special effects of asymmetric configurations. On the other side the calamity configuration based on the lack of self-control on both sides appears still as the most risky. The level of victimization of men seems to be similar if compared to women and their chance to solve the problem is limited due to some specific reasons which are discussed as well.