Joining Forces

Joining Families

Volume 11, Issue 1 • March 2009

R e a l W o r l d R e s e a r c h f o r F a m i l y  A d v o c a c y P r o g r a m s
F e at u r e d I n t e r v i e w

Psychological Aggression and Psychological Abuse:
Is There a Difference?
An Interview with K. Daniel O’Leary, PhD, by James E. McCarroll, PhD
K. Daniel O’Leary, PhD
K. Daniel O’Leary is a Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Director of ClinicalTraining at Stony Brook University. He received
the Distinguished Scientist Award from theClinical Division of the American Psychological
Association in 1985, and he was installed in the
National Academies of Practice in Psychology
in 1986. He has published over 230 articles andIn This Issue
The theme of this issue of Joining Forces Joining Families is psychologicalabuse. Psychological abuse (also sometimes referred to as emotional abuse)
is a distinct component of domestic violence. We feature an interview with
Daniel O’Leary, PhD, a Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the State
University of New York at Stony Brook. Our literature review of psychologicalabuse highlights the seriousness of this form of domestic violence and theneed for increased prevention efforts. Building Bridges to Research reviews
the topic of agreement and how one may measure whether people agree ordisagree by applying theoretical data on acts of violence committed by andbetween partners. Finally, we highlight some websites on psychological abuse
as well as other types of domestic violence.
We look forward to providing relevant and timely topics to support yourwork in 2009.
Contents
Psychological Aggression and Psychological Abuse: Is There a Difference?.......1
Adult Psychological Abuse..............................................................................3
Building Bridges to Research: Measuring Agreement About Acts of Violence
Between Partners...........................................................................................5
Website of Interest..........................................................................................8

eleven books. His current research focuses on the
etiology and treatment of partner aggression, andthe link between marital discord and depression.
Dr. McCarroll: How would you explain
psychological aggression?
Dr. O’Leary: Unlike physical aggression thatis easily classified into various acts like pushing,slapping, and shoving, psychological aggression
can run the gamut from behaviors such as refusing to talk to the person, giving him/her thecold shoulder, constant belittling, and/or controlling their whereabouts — almost keeping
them imprisoned. There are many problems
with the definition of psychological abuse. It iseasier for the legal and mental health professions to agree on a definition of physical abusebecause there is zero tolerance for unwanted
physical aggression. Some form of psychological aggression against a partner is committed
essentially by everybody at some time. Thus,
if one wishes to differentiate between psychological aggression and psychological abuse,
it is necessary to agree on what constitutes
the boundary from one to the other. We havecharacterized four types of Psychological Abuse(O’Leary & Maiuro, 2001):
1. Critical comments that damage a partner’s
self-esteem;
2. Passive-aggressive withholding of support(the silent treatment);
3. Threats of physical harm;
4. Restriction of freedom.
Continued on page 2

Most acts of physicalaggression follow averbal argument or
are in the context of averbal argument.

Dr. McCarroll: Do you differentiate between
psychological aggression and psychologicalabuse?
Dr. O’Leary: In my clinical work, I do not
generally try to distinguish between the two
because it often is unclear where to draw theline. It is akin to the difference between physical aggression versus battering. You can easily
categorize certain psychologically aggressive
behaviors as abusive like taking the spark plugs
out of a car or restricting money and checkbook access. However, if pressed, I would categorize recurring acts of any of the four typesof psychological aggression described above
as psychological abuse. Such recurring acts arelikely to make a partner lose self-esteem and/or be fearful.
Dr. McCarroll: Does psychological abuse
predict physical abuse?
Dr. O’Leary: Not necessarily, but it is the
single best predictor, even better than alcohol.
There are examples of actions taken to harm
another person where there was not a verbal
argument immediately preceding it, but these
are the rare exceptions. Most acts of physicalaggression follow a verbal argument or are in

Joining Forces
Joining Families
Editor-in-Chief
James E. McCarroll, PhD
Email: jmccarroll@usuhs.mil
EditorJohn H. Newby, MSW, PhD
Email: jnewby@usuhs.mil
Joining Forces Joining Families
is a publication of the U. S.
Army Family Morale, Welfare
and Recreation Commandand the Family Violence andTrauma Project of the Centerfor the Study of TraumaticStress (CSTS), Bethesda,
Maryland 20814-4799, tel.
301-295-2470. CSTS is a partof the Dept. of Psychiatry,
USUHS, and a partnering
center of the Defense Centersof Excellence (DCoE).

2 • Joining Forces/Joining Families

Editorial Advisor
LTC Ben Clark, Sr., MSW, PhD
Family Advocacy Program Manager
Headquarters, Department of theArmy
E-mail: Ben.Clark@fmwrc.army.mil
Editorial Consultants
David M. Benedek, MD, LTC, MC, USA
Associate Professor and Scientist
Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress
Uniformed Services University of the
Health Sciences
dbenedek@usuhs.mil
Nancy T. Vineburgh, MA
Director, Office of Public Education
and Preparedness
Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress
Email: nvineburgh@usuhs.mil

the context of a verbal argument. We know thatpeople can experience a great deal of psychological abuse, even if it never occurs with physical abuse. We also know that it is associatedwith a great deal of relationship discord. You
can predict that physical abuse will later occur
if there is a tendency for people to have psychological aggression across time. In other words, itis the extent of psychological aggression that ispredictive of whether a physically aggressive act
will occur (Murphy & O’Leary, 1989).
Dr. McCarroll: What is the trigger in which
psychological aggression escalates to physicalabuse?
Dr. O’Leary: One of the triggers is alcoholor any substance that lowers inhibitions. Another trigger is if the argument taps into what isreally at your core, your sense of who you are asa person or your firmly held beliefs and values.
Dr. McCarroll: One of the missions of the Army
Family Advocacy Program (FAP) is prevention.
What should FAP personnel who give domestic
violence prevention classes tell people about
psychological abuse?
Dr. O’Leary: My first task would be to tellpeople that psychological aggression is a serious
issue. I try to tell mental health audiences theimportance of reducing psychological aggression whether it is through relaxation, medication, relationship enhancement, or financial
consultation. Anything that will reduce psychological aggression will make physical aggression
less probable.
Dr. McCarroll: How do you differentiate
between verbal abuse and psychologicalaggression?
Dr. O’Leary: Individuals who have a difference of opinion and who attempt to resolve
their relationship differences can do so without
being psychologically aggressive, i.e. calling
their partner names, screaming at them or saying things to make the partner feel inferior. To
differentiate assertion from verbal aggression,
Curley and I developed a measure of spousespecific assertion and spouse specific aggression(O’Leary & Curley, 1986).
Dr. McCarroll: How damaging is psychologicalabuse?
Dr. O’Leary: There are a few descriptive
studies where women who have been physicallyabused or battered have also reported psychoContinued on p. 7
March 2009

Adult Psychological Abuse
By James E. McCarroll, PhD

Ninety-nine percentof the women had
experienced someform of emotional
abuse and 72%
reported experiencing
four or more types.

http://www.CSTSonline.org

tion or restriction, jealousy or possessiveness,
Psychological abuse (also sometimes
threats of abuse or harm, threats to end thereferred to as emotional abuse) is a distinct
marital relationship or have an affair, and damcomponent of domestic violence. While adult
physical and sexual abuse are widely recognized age to or destruction of the woman’s property.
Ninety-nine percent of the women had experias domestic violence, psychological abuse has
enced some form of emoreceived much less attional abuse and 72%
tention. The definition
Psychological abuse (alsoreported experiencingof psychological abuse issometimes referred to as
four or more types. The
difficult, particularly inmost frequently reported
regard to satisfying both
emotional abuse) is a distinct
type of abuse was ridithe mental health andcomponent of domestic
cule, but threats of abuse,
legal professions (O’Leary
jealousy, and restriction1999).
violence.
all occurred to a large
Hostility, in many
percentage of the women.
forms, is psychologiRidicule was reported as having a negative
cal aggression. It is relatively common, evenimpact by the highest percentage and threats ofin happily married couples, particularly inabuse were the second most negatively impactyoung couples with or without marital discording type. Seventy-two percent of the women(O’Leary 1999). But, psychological aggression
is not the same as psychological abuse. O’Leary reported that psychological abuse had a morenegative impact on them than physical abuse.
and others have distinguished between aggresNone of the individual types of psychologicalsion and abuse on the basis of the frequency
abuse was related to the frequency of physicaland intensity of negative remarks and threats.
The strict definition of psychological abuse abuse or severity of injuries. However, about
half the women (54%) used the emotional
is broad and often not clear. O’Leary (1999)
abuse incident, particularly threats of abusedefines it as acts of recurring criticism, verbal
and restriction, to predict an occurrence of
aggression, acts of isolation and dominaphysical abuse.
tion toward an intimate partner. Non-verbal
The effects of psychological aggression
psychological abuse, such as stalking, can also
compared to physical aggression were also
be considered psychological abuse. [Note: See
reported in a community sample of couples
Dr. O’Leary’s interview for more on nonverbal psychological abuse.] Potentially abusive (Taft, O’Farrell, Torres, Panuzio, Monson,
Murphy, & Murphy, 2006). In this sample,
behavior can be grouped under the following
psychological aggression victimization was
four primary dimensions (O’Leary and Maiassociated with greater distress, anxiety, anduro, 2001):
physical health symptoms beyond the effects of
1. Damaging to partner’s self-image or selfphysical aggression. Psychological victimization
esteem through denigration,
2. Passive-aggressive withholding of emotion- was also uniquely associated with higher levelsof depression for women only. Possible distinct
al support and nurturance,
etiologies were suggested for male and female
3. Explicit and implicit threatening,
4. Restricting personal territory and freedom. perpetrators and highlighted the need for different models of psychological aggression for
In couples’ therapy, psychological abuse ismen and women.
often recognized as a difficult issue with which
O’Leary and Maiuro (2001) reviewed
to work. The seriousness of the effects of psymeasures of psychological abuse and measureschological abuse was shown in an early study
derived from them. Eight measures that haveby Follingsted, Rutledge, Berg, Hause, & Polek
been used are the Conflict Tactics Scale (Straus,(1990). They studied six types of emotional
Hamby, Boney-McCoy, & Sugarman, 1990), theabuse of 234 women with a history of physicalIndex of Spouse Abuse (Hudson & McIntosh,abuse and related these types to the frequency
and severity of the physical abuse. The six types 1981); Spouse Specific Aggression and Assertion (O’Leary & Curley, 1986), Psychologicalwere: verbal attacks, social or financial isolaJoining Forces/Joining Families • 3

Psychological abusehas substantial
health effects.

Maltreatment of Women (Tolman, 1989),
Index of Psychological Abuse (Sullivan, Parisian & Davidson, 1991), Severity of Violence
Against Women (Marshall, 1992), and theDominance Scale (Hamby, 1996).
Psychological abuse has substantial healtheffects. Female gastroenterology patients withirritable bowel syndrome, a bowel condition
without a known organic basis, reported significantly higher levels of emotional abuse, selfblame and self-silencing than comparison patients who had irritable bowel disease, a bowel
condition with a known organic basis (Ali,Toner, Stuckglass, Gallop, Diamant, Gould,& Videns, 2000). Emotional abuse remained
associated with irritable bowel syndrome evenwhen physical and sexual abuse histories were
controlled. The authors concluded that women
who experienced emotional abuse may be
more likely to develop response patterns ofinhibiting self-expression and taking responsibility for negative events, all of which may leadto increased levels of stress affecting the gastrointestinal system.
Psychological abuse was also associatedwith an increased risk of smoking in a cohortof white, well-educated, and employed women.
Further, when it co-occurred with physical orsexual abuse, the risk was increased (Jun, RichEdwards, Boynton-Jarrett, & Wright, 2008).
Dominance and isolation predicted increases
in depressive symptoms over time in dating
women. These effects were moderated by theirlevels of perception of interpersonal control(Katz & Arias, 1999). Psychological abuse andstalking contributed uniquely to PTSD anddepression symptoms after controlling forthe effects of physical and sexual violence andinjuries (Mechanic, Weaver, & Resick, 2008).
In a study of living in a shelter, psychologicalabuse was a significant predictor of PTSD andintentions to leave the abusive partner evenafter controlling for the effects of physicalabuse (Arias & Pape, 1999). Male-to-female
psychological aggression has also been associated with distress in mothers and internalizing
and externalizing behavior in children (Clarke,
Koenen, Taft, Street, King, & King, 2007).
Importantly, psychological abuse nearly always seems to precede physical abuse and thus
prevention of psychological abuse may prevent
later physical abuse and injury (O’Leary, 1999).
[Editor’s note: See interview with Dr. O’Leary formore on this point.]

4 • Joining Forces/Joining Families

References
Ali A, Toner BB, Stuckless N, Gallop R, DiamantNE, Gould MI, & Videns EI. (2000). Emotional
abuse, slef-blame, and self-silencing in womenwith irritable bowel syndrome. Psychosomatic
Medicine; 62:76–82.
Arias I & Pape KT. (1999). Psychological abuse:
Implications for adjustment and commitment
to leave violent partners. Violence and Victims;
14:55–67.
Clarke SB, Koenen KC, Taft CT, Street AE, King
LA & King DW. (2007), Intimate partner psychological aggression and child behavior problems. Journal of TraumaticStress;54 20:97–101.
Follingstad DR, Ritledge LL, Berg BJ, Hause ES &Polek DS. (1990). The role of emotional abusein physically abusive relationships. Journal of
Family Violence; 5:107–120.
Hamby SL. (1996). The Dominance Scale: Preliminary psychometric properties. Violence
and Victims; 11:199–212.
Hudson WW & McIntosh S. (1981). The index
of spouse abuse. Journal of Marriage and theFamily;43:873–888.
Jun HJ, Rich-Edwards JW, Boynton-Jarrett R, &Wright RJ. (2008). Intimate partner violence
and cigarette smoking: Association between
smoking risk and psychological abuse withand without co-occurrence of physical andsexual abuse. American Journal of Public
Health; 98:527–535.
Katz J & Arias I. (1999). Psychological abuse anddepressive symptoms in dating women: Do
different types of abuse have differential effects? Journal of Family Violence; 14:281–295.
Marshall LL. (1992). Development of the severityof violence against women scales. Journal of
Family Violence; 7:103–121.
Mechanic MB, Weaver TL, & Resick PA. (2008).
Mental health consequences of intimate partner abuse: A multidimensional assessment offour different forms of abuse. Violence Against
Women; 14:634–654.
O’Leary DK. (1999). Psychological abuse: A variable deserving critical attention in domestic
violence. Violence & Victims; 14:3–23.
O’Leary KD & Curley AD. (1986). Assertionand family violence: Correlates of spouseabuse. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy;
12:281–289.
Continued on page 8

March 2009

Building Bridges to Research
Measuring Agreement About Acts of Violence
Between Partners
By James E. McCarroll, PhD, David M. Benedek, MD, and Robert J. Ursano, MD

Measuring agreement
between observers
is a key element of
reliability.

http://www.CSTSonline.org

There have been many studies that haveaddressed whether there are differences in thereports of interpersonal violence (IPV) by
partners (e.g., Arias & Beach, 1987; Heyman& Schlee, 1997; O’Leary & Williams, 2006).
Having an accurate measure of the nature andextent of couple violence is useful in determining the prevalence of IPV, but could also be
helpful clinically. Studies have generally showna significant, but low correlation between couple reports (Archer, 1999; Jouriles & O’Leary,
1985; Schafer, Caetano, & Clark, 2002; Cunradi,
Bersamin, & Ames, 2008). Possible reasons forthis are that in self-reports an individual may
try to make him/herself or their partner lookeither good or bad, or individuals may havefears of legal or partner repercussions if theyreport accurately. Also, self-report instruments
lack specificity in the measures or definitionsof reported behaviors (Simpson & Christensen,
2005). In general, results are consistent infinding that both men and women will reporta lower level of aggression than their partners
attribute to them and men tend to underreport their own violence more than do women.
The level of agreement tends to be higher on
measures that are more specific and objective(Simpson & Christensen, 2005).
The purpose of this article is to present a
statistical method for calculating agreement.
The degree of agreement may be considereda psychometric property of a measurement
instrument, in this case the verbal agreement
between partners on acts of violence. Amongother psychometric measures discussed in ourprevious descriptions of statistical concepts arereliability, validity, internal consistency, andinter-rater agreement. Measures of agreement
have both reliability and validity properties.
There is no gold standard for either of these so
we must depend on estimates. In this case, weare estimating how reliable and valid are thereports of two people: whether either or bothreporters are reporting consistently (reliability)and giving accurate information (validity). If
each member of a couple describes incidents ofviolence consistently over time, their descriptions may be considered reliable. Their levelof agreement also has validity considerations.

If they do not agree, why not? Some possible reasons for this are suggested in the firstparagraph.
Measuring agreement between observers isa key element of reliability. This can be donein several ways. One way is to calculate thepercent agreement. However, percent agreement is not the best method. Some reasons forthis are because it does not tell the prevalenceof the phenomenon under study, how many
disagreements occurred, or whether one rater
was more accurate than another (Jekel, Katz, &Elmore, 2001).
Cohen’s Kappa is a statistic that has beenused in computing agreement between spouseson the frequency of aggression. However, toeasily calculate agreement on aggression (orany other variable of interest) in a clinical environment, a better choice is to use the Kappa
Test Ratio (Jekel, Katz, & Elmore, 2001). This
test gives the agreement between two reporters above chance level. Its result is a ratio, butthat ratio is often given as a percentage. The
test is calculated, similar to chi-square, on
the difference between the observed (actual)
versus the expected (by chance) values. The
value of the result of the test can be expressed
as a ratio or as a percentage. The ratio can varyfrom –1 (perfect disagreement) to +1 (perfectagreement). A value of 0 means that the agreement is equal to chance. The ratio can also be
expressed as a percentage (numerator divided
by denominator). Jekel, Katz, and Elmore(2001) suggest that when the percentage is lessthan 20%, the amount of agreement is negligible; between 20–40% is low; 40–60% is fair;
60–80% is good; and over 80% is excellent.
Here is an example using fictitious data
about agreement between acts of aggression
between two partners (Table 1). Consider thatyou want each member of a couple to countthe number of days on which aggression by
one partner, the man, for example, occurs.
In 80 days, they both agree that aggression
occurred on 20 days; they also agree that aggression did not occur on 45 days. The woman
thought that aggression occurred on 10 days,
Continued on p. 6
Joining Forces/Joining Families • 5

An accurate measure of
the nature and extent
of couple violence isuseful in determining
the prevalence of IPV
and can be helpful
clinically.

but her partner thought it had not occurred;
the man thought that aggression occurred on
5 days, but the woman believed it had not. Like
many comparisons in research, these data canbe displayed in a 4-fold table. The key to how
these numbers are used to calculate the Kappa
statistic are given in Table 2 and the paragraphs that follow it.
In order to calculate the Kappa Ratio,
you need to calculate an overall expectedvalue. This is based on the amount of positive
agreement (cell a) expected by chance and theamount of negative agreement (cell d) expected by chance. In other words, based on chancealone, how many times would you expect
them to agree and how many times would you
expect them to disagree? This is calculated by

Table 1. Number of Agreements (Positive) and Disagreements(Negative) Between Spouses About Conflict						

80 (total possible agreements) – 43.75(expected by chance for cells a and d)

Woman’s Countsof Man’s Aggression
Negative

Total

Positive

20

5

25

This value of .586 can be expressed as
58.6%. Thus, according to the standards cited byJekel, Katz, & Elmore (2001), the agreement isgreater than only by chance, but still is only fair.

Negative

10

45

55

References

Total

30

50

80

Table 2. Key to the Calculation of the Kappa Statistic
			
			
		
Man’s Countsof His Own
Aggression

65 (agreements) – 43.75 			
(expected by chance for cells a and d) = .586

Positive		Man’s Countsof His Own
Aggression

multiplying the marginal totals (a + b) and (c+ d) together and dividing by the total (a + b +c + d) number of possible days on which they
could agree or disagree.
For our fictitious example, the observed
agreement equals 65 (a + d). The maximum
possible agreement equals 80. The expectedvalue for cell a is (25)(30) / 80 = 9.375. The expected value for cell d is (55)(50) / 80 = 34.375.
The total of the two values is that which would
be expected by chance, 43.75.
Now we can calculate the Kappa ratio, thedifference between the observed and expectedvalues (actual and chance) divided by the total
number of possible agreements minus thatvalue which would be expected by chance. The
calculation is the following:

Arias I & Beach SRH. (1987). Validity of selfreports of marital violence. Journal of Family
Violence; 2:139–149.

Woman’s Countsof Man’s Aggression

Positive

Negative

Total

Positive

a

b

a+b

Negative

c

d

c+d

Total

a+c

b+d

a+b+c+d

Cell a is the count of the number of days the man and the woman agree that aggression
occurred.
Cell b is the count of the number of days the man said aggression occurred, but the
woman disagreed.
Cell c is the count of the number of days the woman said aggression occurred, but theman disagreed.
Cell d is the count of the number of days the man and the woman agree that aggression
did not occur.

6 • Joining Forces/Joining Families

Archer J. (1999). Assessment of the reliability of
the Conflict Tactics Scales: A meta-analytic
review. Journal of Interpersonal Violence;
14:1263–1289.

Cunradi CB, Bersamin M, & Ames G. (2008).
Agreement on intimate partner violence
among a sample of blue-collar couples. Journalof Interpersonal Violence; Online First, Published on April 22, 2008.
Heyman & Schlee (1997). Toward a better
estimate of the prevalence of partner abuse:
Adjusting rates based on the sensitivity of
the Conflict Tactics Scale. Journal of Family
Psychology; 11:332–338.
Jekel JF, Katz DL, & Elmore JG. (2001). Epidemiology, biostatistics and preventive medicine(2d Edition). Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders, pp.
113–115.
Jouriles EN & O’Leary KD. (1985). Interspousal
reliability of reports of marital violence.
Journal of consulting and Clinical Psychology;
53:419–421.
Continued on page 7
March 2009

Interview with K. Daniel O’Leary, PhD, from page 3
logical abuse. They reported that the psychological abuse had
a more negative effect than the physical abuse (Follingstad,
Rutledge, Berg, Hause, & Polek, 1990; Arias & Pape, 2001). Anything that goes to the core of one’s self-esteem, is most likely tobe emotionally damaging to the person.
Dr. McCarroll: Do you see people in your clinic who come infor help with purely psychological abuse or verbal abuse?
Dr. O’Leary: We found that if you ask men and women tobriefly describe their major marital problems, about 50% of
men and 60% of women report communication. Lack of sexuality and personality style problems are reported as the next
most frequent problems by both husbands and wives (O’Leary,Vivian, & Malone, 1992). Another form of psychological abuse,
which is particularly damaging, is threatening to leave therelationship. When people come into therapy, we say that oneof the ground rules is not to tell the other that you are thinking
about divorce or you are threatening divorce. It just sets thingsback and instills more distrust.
Dr. McCarroll: How do you measure psychologicalaggression?
Dr. O’Leary: We use a variation of the Conflict Tactics Scale(Straus, Hamby, Boney-McCoy, & Sugarman, 1990), a selfreport of aggressive behavior, with potential clients for therapy.
We ask them to describe any major arguments that have takenplace.
In the interview, we try to get a more detailed elaborationof what happened in the most recent incident and to get a senseof what both of them will own up to. Both men and women
underreport negative things that they have done, though men
tend to underreport more than women, particularly on the
more serious aggressive acts.
We have found that if you look at the agreement about
psychological aggression or physical aggression it is not substantially different than agreement on positive activities likekiss your partner, engage in outside activities together, laughtogether (O’Leary & Williams, 2006).
Dr. McCarroll: The literature on psychological abuse seems
largely to be about psychological abuse of women. Is there
any literature about women as perpetrators?
Dr. O’Leary: If you look at all the published studies onhusband and wife interactions in marital assessments, womenactually engage in more negative, more critical behavior than
do men whereas men engage in more withdrawing-type behavior (Woodin, 2008). So, it would make some sense that womenmight score as high or higher on measures of psychologicalabuse. We know that on measures of psychological aggression
like the Straus scale and even on a scale like dominance andjealousy, women in our samples had scores that were essentiallynot different from those of men.

http://www.CSTSonline.org

Dr. McCarroll: Is adult psychological abuse recognized instate laws?
Dr. O’Leary: In New York State it is. It is not uncommon tohave orders of protection based on threats. When a person isalleged to have made threats against an individual’s person or
their animals, an order of protection can be initiated throughthe courts without any evidence of physical contact.
Dr. McCarroll: Thank you for your time and your insights.
Dr. O’Leary: You are welcome.

References
Arias I, & Pape KT. (2001). Psychological abuse: Implications foradjustment and commitment to leave violent partners (pp.
137–151). In O’Leary, K. D., & Maiuro, R. D. Psychologicalabuse in violent domestic relations. New York: Springer Publishing Co.
Follingstad DR, Rutledge LL, Berg BJ, Hause ES, & Polek DS.
(1990). The role of emotional abuse in physically abusive relationships. Journal of Family Violence, 5, 107–119.
Murphy CM & O’Leary KD. (1989). Psychological aggression
predicts physical aggression. Journal of Consulting and ClinicalPsychology, 5, 579–582.
O’Leary KD & Curley AD. (1986). Assertion and family violence:
Correlates of spouse abuse. Journal of Marital and Family
Therapy, 12 (3), 281–289.
O’Leary KD & Maiuro RD. (2001). Psychological abuse in violent
domestic relations. New York: Springer Publishing Co.
O’Leary KD, Vivian D, & Malone J. (1992). Assessment of physicalaggression against women in marriage: The need for multimodal assessment. Behavioral Assessment, 14, 5–14.
O’Leary KD & Williams MC. (2006) Agreement about acts of aggression in marriage. Journal of Family Psychology, 20, 656–662.
Straus MA, Hamby SL, Boney-McCoy S, & Sugarman DB. (1990).
The Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2). Journal of Family
Issues; 17:283–316.
Woodin E. (2008). Communication and problem solving in marriage: A meta-analytic review. Unpublished manuscript. Stony
Brook University.

Building Bridges to Research, from page 6
O’Leary KD & Williams MC. (2006). Agreement about acts of aggression in marriage. Journal of Family Violence; 20:656–662.
Schafer J, Caetano R, & Clark CC. (2002). Agreement about
violence in U.S. couples. Journal of Interpersonal Violence;
17:457–470.
Simpson LE & Christensen A. (2005). Spousal agreement regarding relationship aggression on the Conflict Tactics Scale-2.
Psychological Assessment; 17:423–432.

Joining Forces/Joining Families • 7

Websites of Interest

There are relatively few websites specific to the subject ofadult psychological abuse or psychological aggression, butsome sites have sections on this topic
Psychological abuse is sometimes referred to as emotional
abuse. A website that gives a description of emotional abuse
including examples and misconceptions about emotional
abuse can be found at http://emotionalheal.org/basics.htm.
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence
Website, www.ncadv.org has a section on psychological abuseof children, adults, and the elderly. It contains definitions,
statistics, and other facts about psychological abuse with accompanying references.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has a compendium of research tools entitled “Measuring Intimate Partner Violence Victimization and Perpetration.” It includes 12
scales to measure psychological (or emotional) abuse perpetration. Some of the scales measure physical and sexual abuse
as well as psychological abuse. Among the scales included are
the Abusive Behavior Inventory, the Psychological Maltreatment of Women Inventory, and the Profile of Psychological
Abuse. When the scale is not copyrighted (in open literature)
all the items are given. When the scale is copyrighted only
samples are provided. It can be found at http://cdc.gov/ncipc/
dvp/Compendium/IPV%20Compendium.pdf.
While not on a website, other measures of psychological(emotional) abuse can be found in
the book by K. D. O’Leary and Roland
Maiuro (Eds.). (2001). Psychological
Abuse in Violent Relationships. New
York: Springer Publications, Inc.

Adult Psychological Abuse, from page 4
O’Leary KD & Maiuro RD. (2001). Psychological abuse in violent
domestic relations. New York: Springer Publishing Company.
Straus MA, Hamby SL, Boney-McCoy S, & Sugarman DB. (1990).
The Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2). Journal of Family
Issues; 17:283–316.
Sullivan CM, Parisian JA & Davidson WS. (1991). Index of psychological abuse: Development of a measure. Poster presented at theannual conference of the American Psychological Association,
San Francisco, CA.

8 • Joining Forces/Joining Families

Taft CT, O’Farrell TJ, Torres SE, Panuzio J, Monson CM, Murphy
M, & Murphy CM. (2006). Examining the correlates of psychological aggression among a community sample of couples.
Journal of Family Psychology; 20:581–588.
Tolman RM. (1989). The development of a measure of psychological maltreatment of women by their male partners.
Violence and Victims; 4:159–178.

March 2009