Determinants of reciprocal verbal partner violence during the COVID-19 pandemic

The global spread of the coronavirus has provided many challenges for people’s daily lives. Due to governmental lockdown measures, many people found their social life constrained to their own home and the people they share this with. For people who live together with their partner, new challenges also arise for their relationship. Although the increased amount of time and activities spent together can be beneficial for some, this isolation could have detrimental consequences for the relationship of others and could lead to increased conflict or in some cases even verbal and physical violence. In our study, we aimed to identify which groups of people were particularly vulnerable for reciprocal partner violence during the COVID-19 pandemic and which stressors may play a role in this. As such, we conducted a large scale online survey study (n = 1491, 74% women). We found that the occurrence and frequency of partner aggression during the corona lockdown differed based on a person’s gender, age, work situation, parenthood, the ability to seclude oneself from other members of the household, and social capital. Furthermore, we found that reciprocal verbal partner violence was associated with parenting stress, financial stress, work stress,mental health issues, and stress about the corona crisis. At the conference, we would like to discuss scientific and societal implications of our findings.

Jaar van publicatie:2020

Toegankelijkheid:Open