The Gender Perspective on Parent-to-child Aggression: Gender and Gender-constellations

Abstract

Parent-to-child aggressive behavior is a common risk factor for children’s health. Gender is correlated also to the odds of using aggression and the odds of being a victim of aggression. Yet, only few studies have considered the constellation of perpetrator’s and victim’s gender as a factor of parental aggression. The current study addresses parent-to-child aggressive behavior while focusing on the constellation of perpetrator’s and victim’s gender (i.e., mother–daughter, mother–son, father–daughter, father–son). It utilizes a community sample of Israeli university students (N = 508), 78% of which are female, on average 25.67 years of age (SD = 8.29). The participants reported the incidence and frequency of verbal and physical aggressive behavior of their parents against them during the years of middle school. The results show gender and gender-constellation to be significantly correlated with parental aggression. Overall, sons were more likely to suffer both verbal and physical aggression from their parents than daughters were. Only paternal verbal and physical aggression was more common against daughters, and only maternal verbal and physical aggression was more common against sons. Parental verbal and physical aggression from both parents were more common against sons. For all types and forms of parental aggression, daughters reported higher frequencies. These results suggest that while parent’s gender might predict their overall aggressive behavior, and child’s gender might predict their overall odds to be victimized by parental aggression, gender-constellation might create gender-specific selective patterns of parental aggressive behavior. Thus, the theoretical contribution of this study is in emphasizing that gender-constellations have an explanatory value beyond gender alone. These findings might be valuable to assess the risk of daughters and sons to suffer parental aggression, and for practitioners to provide apt professional response.

Keywords

parental aggression parent-to-child violence gender gender-constellation gender-interaction

Introduction

Parent-to-child aggressive behavior is a common social problem in virtually any human society today (UNICEF, 2014). The forms of parental aggression vary greatly and are termed diversely in scientific publications. The current research focuses on the both prevailing forms of parental aggressive behavior: verbal aggression—which is often the most prominent behavioral expression of psychological abuse—and physical aggression. The definitions of verbal and physical aggression used here, follow Straus’ conflict tactics framework. Straus defined verbal aggression as acts that symbolically hurt the other or threaten him, and physical aggression as acts of physical force against another person (Gelles & Straus, 1978; Straus, 1979). In Israel, no representative national studies on the prevalence of verbal or physical parental aggression have been conducted yet (Ben-Arieh & Haj-Yahia, 2006; Finkelhor, 1994; Pereda et al., 2009). Estimates published by the Israel National Council for the Child (2018) are based on data from social or judicial interventions and show the numbers to be substantial but declining steadily throughout the years. In one research comprising sample and timeframe which are similar to the current study, 49.7% of the respondents reported at least one incident of parental aggression (Winstok, 2015). Research literature provides profound evidence that in all its forms, parental aggression is harmful to the child (Donovan & Brassard, 2011; Gershoff, 2010; Gershoff & Grogan-Kaylor, 2016; Morimoto & Sharma, 2004). Beyond the most obvious short-term effects, such as enhanced stress, fear, physical pain and injury, even light to moderate parental aggression endangers healthy child-development and growth, with sometimes lifelong detrimental consequences (for an overview on short- and long-term effects, refer to Mehlhausen-Hassoen & Winstok, 2019). The incidence and the consequences of parental aggression toward their children, make it a severe and common social problem, and therefore an imperative for research to understand the mechanisms behind it even further.

Research has identified numerous correlates and predictors of parental aggressive behavior, for example, other forms of violence and mistreatment, educational background of child and parents, certain SES indices or parental exposure to childhood abuse (for an overview, refer to Lakhdir et al., 2017; Winstok, 2016). The current study focuses on parents’ and children’s gender and limits itself to the years the child has been in middle school, roughly between the ages 12 to 15, which are the years of early to middle adolescence and puberty. Gender-specific differences of parent-to-child aggression, that is differences between mothers’ aggressive behavior as opposed to fathers’ aggressive behavior and differences between daughters’ exposure to parental aggression as opposed to sons’ exposure to parental aggression, have been subject to research in the past, and the current study draws its roots from concepts developed in such studies (refer to Winstok, 2014, 2016). Yet, relatively little attention has been given to gender-constellations, that is the combinations of parent’s and child’s gender (i.e., mother–daughter, mother–son, father–daughter, father–son; Mehlhausen-Hassoen, 2019).

The first aim of the current study is to investigate gender-specific differences in the incidence of verbal and physical parental aggression towards children. The questions addressed are: Does the incidence of parental aggression towards children differ among the four-abovementioned gender-constellations? Are there differences between verbal and physical aggression in this respect? The second aim of the current study is to investigate gender-specific differences in the frequency, which is equivalent to the term chronicity used by Straus (Straus & Hamby, 1997), of verbal and physical parental aggression towards children. The questions addressed are: Does the frequency of parental aggression towards children differ among the four-abovementioned gender-constellations? Are there differences between verbal and physical aggression in this respect?

Theoretical Background

The next few paragraphs will present some of the current knowledge regarding gender-specific differences in parent-to-child aggressive behavior. Then, the limitations of the available knowledge will be outlined and finally, the current study will be presented.

Gender and Aggressive Behavior

Gender-differences in aggressive behavior have been reported in numerous studies (Burton et al., 2007; Ellis et al., 2008; Hyde, 2005). Overall, males exhibit more aggression than females, especially those forms of aggression that are highly conspicuous, namely, physical aggression (Archer, 2004; Hyde, 2005). When less overt forms of aggression were taken into account, such as verbal, psychological and relational aggression, gender-differences were reported to be smaller (Archer, 2004; Björkqvist, 2018). Fraczek et al. (2016) found female aggression to be more emotionally regulated than male aggression, and their readiness to exhibit aggression to be more emotion-based than that of males. This might partially explain that in several studies female aggression was reported to match or even to exceed male aggression within the context of close relationships (Cross et al., 2011; Kring, 2010).

Parent’s Gender and Parental Aggression

The relationship between a parent and her or his child is for many one of the most emotionally charged relationships of their lives. Parent–child relationships are also substantially influenced by stereotype gender-roles of mothers and fathers respectively and are governed by gender-specific expectations from others and from oneself. Mothers, for example, are expected to spend more time with their children than fathers, and generally do so (Huerta et al., 2013). Mothers are, therefore, more often obliged to deal with challenges in their relationship with their children (Gelles, 1989). Consequently, numerous studies have shown that mothers are more prone to exhibit aggressive behavior against their children than fathers do, with that difference between the parents being more pronounced among parents of young children (that is: when the mother generally spends even more time with her child often staying at home) and declining as the child grows older (that is: when the mother generally spends less time with her child already attending school and other out-of-home activities; Dietz, 2000; Lansford et al., 2010; Meier et al., 2009; Straus, 2001; Straus et al., 2013). Perez-Albeniz and de Paul (2004) found that for mothers, but not for fathers, higher levels of personal distress correlate with a higher risk for child physical abuse; a finding which might correspond with the more pronounced emotional root-cause of female aggression. Little to no research addressed the role of parent’s gender as a factor for specifically verbal aggression (or psychological aggression) against their children (Straus & Field, 2003). Given that in most studies mothers show more parental aggression than fathers and that women generally tend more towards non-physical aggression than men do, one might assume that mothers will also exhibit more often verbal aggression than fathers will. However, research findings regarding the effects of parent’s gender on parental aggression are rather inconsistent (Chang et al., 2003). Several studies suggest there are no significant gender-differences at all or even reported a higher prevalence of paternal aggression (Lytton & Romney, 1991; McKee et al., 2007). Others suggest that gender-differences in parental aggression may depend on the cultural background (Cui et al., 2016; Lansford et al., 2010). Best et al. (1994) found that parent–child interactions vary across both gender and culture. They conclude that while parents’ gender generally does influence their behavior towards their child, culture alters the display of those gender-differences due to culture-specific parental beliefs, values, norms activities and styles of interaction that correspond to the customary gender-roles in each society.

Child’s Gender and Parental Aggression

Cultural variance was also reported in the context of differences in parental aggression by child’s gender (Lysenko et al., 2013). Other studies have found the difference in parental aggression experienced by daughters and sons to be nonsignificant (Annerbäck et al., 2010; Finkelhor et al., 2009; Grogan-Kaylor & Otis, 2007; Stith et al., 2009). Yet, many studies have shown that sons experience more parental aggression than daughters, especially light to moderate physical aggression (i.e., corporal punishment; Bardi & Borgognini-Tarli, 2001; Day et al., 2006; Elder & Bowerman, 2018; Gershoff, 2002; Jansen et al., 2012; Lytton & Romney, 1991; Mahoney et al., 2000; Straus & Stewart, 1999; Tang, 2006). This phenomenon is often explained by boys behaving more aggressively themselves and being harder to discipline than girls, which might increase parents’ willingness to use harsher parenting strategies, including corporal punishment (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1978; Parke & Slaby, 1983). Studies that focused explicitly on verbal parental aggression (psychological aggression) also came to rather contradictory conclusions (Black et al., 2001). Miller-Perrin and Perrin (2013) suggest a shift over time in findings, with girls becoming slightly more likely to suffer parental aggression than in the past. This proposition, however intriguing and evidently in accordance with a recent trend of fathers to spend more time with their children and being more involved in raising them (Maume, 2011), might need further support.

Gender-constellations and Parental Aggression

Across several papers, Murray A. Straus developed the Dyadic Concordance Types (DCTs), a classification of family aggression by gender-interactions in male-only, female-only, and both aggressed categories (Straus, 2015a), and promoted its usage in research and practice (Rodriguez & Straus, 2017; Straus, 2015b, 2016). He suggested that the distinct categories, that is, DCTs, differ substantially by their individual, interpersonal, familial and social-cultural characteristics, and showed that DCTs have a real-life impact on perpetrator, victim, the aggressive behavior and its outcome—for family aggression in general and child maltreatment in particular (Rebellon & Straus, 2017; Straus & Douglas, 2019).

Despite Straus’ proposition, gender-constellations in respect to aggressive behavior have received limited scientific attention (Harris, 1994). Nevertheless, some studies did report significant effects of the gender-constellation on parental aggression. McKee et al. (2007), for example, reported that fathers used significantly more harsh physical discipline against their sons than did mothers, a difference found in relation to daughters or with harsh verbal discipline. Hallers-Haalboom et al. (2016) reported converse results, showing that mothers used more physical interference for disciplining their sons. They also suggested that birth-order and the child’s age might have moderating effects for that matter. Some research found that fathers more than mothers tend to differentiate their behavior according to their child’s gender (Lytton & Romney, 1991; Siegal, 1987), especially in respect to strategies of discipline (Das Eiden et al., 2001). In other studies (e.g., Kochanska et al., 2009), the data did not provide proof for differentiated parental behavior by child’s gender. Harris (1991) pointed out, that gender-constellations alter the evaluation of acts of physical aggression. Overall, aggression from males and aggression towards females are viewed most negatively. Herzberger and Tennen (1985) conducted an experimental research to explore the impact that gender of parent, child, and observer has on the perception of harsh parental discipline. Discipline directed at daughters was rated more severe than discipline directed at sons and was more likely to be labeled abuse, especially when the disciplining parent was the father. On the other hand, father’s harsh discipline was more likely to be seen as appropriate in comparison to the child’s misbehavior, regardless of the child’s gender. This raises the question of whether parental behavior is partially governed by parents’ and children’s concepts of appropriate gender-interactions in parenting, or role-concepts acquired by socialization within a certain cultural context. Some research addressing gender-constellations in parental aggression focused on their impact on the outcomes (Davidov & Khoury-Kassabri, 2013). Deater-Deckard and Dodge (1997) found that parental aggression in same-gender pairs (i.e., mother–daughter, father–son) results in more externalized problems in child’s behavior than parental aggression in other-gender pairs (i.e., mother–son, father–daughter), and hypothesized—following Maccoby and Jacklin’s (1978) classic work—that this occurs due to a role-model effect in the case of same-gender constellations. In a meta-analysis across six different studies, however, Gershoff (2002) did not find such a pattern to be consistently represented. Perhaps, parental aggression that is perceived as conformant with appropriate roles of parent–child gender-interactions results in more adaptive outcomes, while parental aggression that is perceived as inappropriate parent–child gender-interaction results in more detrimental outcomes.

Limitations of the Current Knowledge

Most studies support the significance of parent’s and child’s gender as well as the constellation between both in the context of parental aggression, its causes, formations, and effects. Nevertheless, above this point, there seems to be little consistency among scholars. In the numerous publications addressing gender as a factor for parental aggressive behavior, and the few addressing gender-constellations in this context, findings vary greatly and are often contradictory. Especially some of the meta-analytic papers suggest that research-design might explain those differences. The different populations represented in those studies, sampling strategies, data collection strategies, the identity of the respondents (i.e., mothers and/or fathers, young or adult children, observers) and alike, they all may show their impact in the reported results. There is strong scientific support for the importance of context, especially culture, for understanding the interaction between gender and parental aggression. Some scholars have suggested that gender-related patterns of parent–child interactions are subject to change over time. Indeed, numerous keystone-studies were conducted in the 70ies and 80ies of the last century. Since then, family-interactions and, even more so, attitudes and views of gender-roles have changed substantially. It is reasonable to assume that at least some of the inconsistencies in the findings reported in literature are due to those changes in society.

The current study attempts to analyze the impact of gender and gender-constellation on parental aggressive behavior, verbal and physical, within a community sample of young academics in a mostly liberal, modern western society today. The retrospect data refer to their years at middle school, roughly between the ages 12 and 15. This age range was chosen for several reasons. The timeframe “middle school” makes it easier for respondents to remember and to provide credible information in the retrospect. Furthermore, those are the years of early to middle adolescence and puberty. At this age, conflict between parents and children is often substantial and many parents are challenged by the need to control their children’s behavior. In addition to that, issues of gender-identity, gender-roles, and gender-specific behavior are often pronounced during those years. Several other studies made use of similar timeframes (refer to Gershoff & Grogan-Kaylor, 2016). The hypotheses of this study follow the most prevalent findings represented in scientific literature.

Hypotheses

The hypotheses in this research are divided into three distinct sets: The first three hypotheses concern the incidence of parental aggression involving mothers as opposed to fathers. The next six hypotheses concern the incidence of parental aggression involving daughters as opposed to sons. The last two hypotheses concern the frequency of parental aggression experienced by the respondents.

The incidence of parental aggression by parent’s gender.

It is hypothesized that more children experience maternal aggression than paternal aggression. The second hypothesis is that this difference will be more pronounced for verbal aggression, and less for physical aggression. The third hypothesis is that most children experiencing parental aggression at all will experience parental aggression from both their parents, less children will experience only maternal and even less only paternal aggression.

The incidence of parental aggression by child’s gender.

The fourth hypothesis is that more sons experience parental aggression than daughters. The fifth hypothesis is that this difference will be more pronounced for physical aggression, and less for verbal aggression. The sixth hypothesis is that most daughters experiencing physical parental aggression at all will experience physical parental aggression from both their parents, less daughters will experience only paternal and even less only maternal physical aggression. The seventh hypothesis is that most sons experiencing physical parental aggression at all will experience physical parental aggression from both their parents, less sons will experience only maternal and even less only paternal physical aggression. The eighth hypothesis is that most daughters experiencing verbal parental aggression at all will experience verbal parental aggression from both their parents, less daughters will experience only paternal and even less only maternal verbal aggression. The ninth hypothesis is that most sons experiencing verbal parental aggression at all will experience verbal parental aggression from both their parents, less sons will experience only maternal and even less only paternal verbal aggression.

The frequency of parental aggression.

The tenth hypothesis is that for all gender-constellations, the frequency of verbal parental aggression will be higher than for physical parental aggression. The eleventh hypothesis is that for all gender-constellations, the frequency of parental aggression experienced by daughters will be higher than the frequency of parental aggression experienced by sons.

Method

Sample and Population

A community sample of 508 students from various departments in institutions of higher education in northern Israel was used in this study. The sample was 78.0% women and 22.0% men. The average age of the participants was 25.7 years (SD = 8.29). The ethnic breakdown was as follows: 59.8% were Jewish, 21.2% were Muslim, 9.5% were Christian and 9.5% self-identified as “Other.” The respondents rated the level of religiosity of their family of origin as follows: 40.3% secular, 23.8% secular with some traditional elements, 21.6% traditional, 13.1% religious and 1.2% ultra-orthodox. The respondents rated the economic status of their family of origin as follows: 66.3% rated their family’s economic status as average, 22.8% as above-average, and 10.9% as below-average. The sample is, therefore, heterogenous and comprises representatives of the various populations attending academic studies in northern Israel’s colleges and universities.

Data Collection Principles and Compliance With Ethical Standards

The population sampled in this study consisted of students from various institutions and programs in the departments of humanities, health and welfare, medicine, and social sciences in northern Israel. Undergraduate students trained as surveyors collected the data in the course of classes attended by the participants. After introductory explanations, the surveyors distributed the questionnaires to those who consented to participate.

This study is approved by the ethics committee of the Faculty of Social Welfare and Health Studies at the University of Haifa and is registered there as No. 018/18.

Research Instruments

Research data were collected using questionnaires that asked about parental aggressive behavior towards the respondent during childhood. The timeframe of childhood was limited to their years at middle school (ages 12 to 15), which was written in the questionnaire’s instructions and explained orally by the surveyors.

Parental aggressive behavior measuring instrument.

The instrument for measuring parental aggressive behavior is based on Conflict Tactic Scales (CTS) principles (Straus et al., 1996; Straus et al., 1998). This means that the instrument focused solely on behavioral data (conflict tactics) and measured the incidence of the use of different tactics, while deliberately excluding attitudes, emotions, and cognitive appraisals of behaviors (Straus, 2007). The measurement was developed by the author and his colleagues and was previously successfully implemented among student populations in Israel (Mehlhausen-Hassoen, 2019; Winstok, 2015). It consists of 14 items measuring the incidence of distinct types of verbal aggression (e.g., yelling and swearing) and physical aggression (e.g., shoving and slapping) by the mother and the father, separately, towards their child (parental aggressive behavior). The questionnaire addressed research participants’ middle school years (ages 12– 15). The response options for each aggressive behavior item were: (1) the behavior was not used in the specified period (a combination of two response options: the behavior was never used and the behavior was not used during the specified period, but was used at other times); (2) the behavior was used several times a year but not every month; (3) the behavior was used every month; (4) the behavior was used every week; (5) the behavior was used every day.

Two research variables, representing the frequency of aggressive parental behavior, were computed according to their average item score. The measurement of parental verbal aggression consisted of four items. Reliability as internal consistency was tested and yielded good results (α Cronbach = .73). The measurement of parental physical aggression consisted of 10 items. Reliability as internal consistency was tested and yielded good results (α Cronbach = .86). Based on these two variables, four distinct groups were identified: (a) respondents that reported no parental aggression, (b) respondents that reported only maternal aggression, (c) respondents that reported only paternal aggression, and (d) respondents that reported parental aggression from both parents, for each, verbal and physical aggression respectively.

Background and control variables.

Several additional measures were taken for means of sample description and as control variables. These included age, gender, ethnicity, religiosity today and of the family of origin during childhood, number of siblings, economic status today and of the family of origin during childhood, number of friends today and during childhood, and academic achievement today and during childhood.

Analytic Strategy

To address the first nine hypotheses, the cross tab of two research variables was constructed: respondent’s gender and respondent’s experience of parental aggressive behavior. The latter associates each respondent with one of the following four groups: (a) no parental aggression, (b) only maternal aggression, (c) only paternal aggression, and (d) parental aggression from both parents. To test for differences between the frequencies of cases in each category, chi-square values were calculated for verbal and physical aggression separately.

To address the last two hypotheses, a univariate analysis of variance was conducted. The frequencies of both forms of parental aggression were separately entered into the analysis as dependent variables. The impact of two independent variables on these dependent variables was tested using a repeated-measures procedure. Both independent variables were between-subject variables: gender of the respondent and association with one of the three types of aggression (only maternal, only paternal, or by both parents).

Results

The Incidence of Parental Aggression by Parent’s Gender

During the specified timeframe, 75.1% of the respondents have experienced either verbal and/or physical parental aggression, 74.0% have experienced verbal parental aggression and 26.0% physical parental aggression. The crosstab analysis of respondent’s gender and association with one of the four parental aggression exposure groups (i.e., no parental aggression, only maternal aggression, only paternal aggression, parental aggression from both parents) for both forms of parental aggression addressed, revealed significant differences between daughters and sons in terms of their exposure to verbal (χ²_{(3, 497)} = 10.177, p = .017) and physical parental aggression (χ²_{(3, 497)} = 14.646, p = .002). The results of the crosstab analysis, limited to the middle school years, are represented in Figure 1.

Figure 1.

Prevalence of respondents’ reports of verbal and physical parental aggression by type (only paternal, only maternal, or both parents) and respondent’s gender.

Contrary to the first hypothesis, the overall incidence of parental aggression involving mothers (64.0%) was somewhat lower than that involving fathers (67.4%). Also, the second hypothesis was not supported by the data, as the incidence of maternal verbal aggression (62.8%) was lower than that of paternal verbal aggression (67.0%), and the incidence of maternal physical aggression (18.7%) was slightly lower than that of paternal physical aggression (19.3%). According to the third hypothesis, most children experiencing any form of parental aggression at all, experienced parental aggression from both parents (56.3%). Contrary to this hypothesis, more children experienced only paternal aggression (11.1%) than only maternal aggression (7.6%).

The Incidence of Parental Aggression by Child’s Gender

According to the fourth hypothesis, more sons experienced parental aggression of any form (81.2%) than daughters (73.2%). In detail, 72.2% of the daughters experienced verbal parental aggression as opposed to 80.4% of the sons (difference: 8.2%), and 23.6% of the daughters experienced physical parental aggression as opposed to 33.9% of the sons (difference: 10.3%). As hypothesized in the fifth hypothesis, the difference between daughters and sons is therefore more pronounced for physical parental aggression, but this association is not strong.

The Incidence of Parental Aggression by Gender-constellation

According to the sixth hypothesis, most daughters experiencing physical parental aggression experienced aggression from both their parents (10.1%), less only paternal (8.3%), and even less only maternal physical parental aggression (5.2%). Respectively, and according to the seventh hypothesis, most sons experiencing physical parental aggression experienced aggression from both their parents (18.8%), less only maternal (11.6%), and even less only paternal physical aggression (3.6%). While, according to the eighth hypothesis, most daughters experiencing verbal parental aggression experienced aggression from both their parents (52.5%), contrary to this hypothesis, more daughters experienced only paternal verbal aggression (13.0%) than only maternal verbal aggression (6.8%). According to the ninth hypothesis, most sons experiencing verbal parental aggression experienced aggression from both their parents (67.0%), less only maternal (8.0%), and even less only paternal verbal aggression (5.4%).

The Frequency of Parental Aggression by Parent’s Gender

The inferential statistics for the repeated-measures procedure are presented in Table 1. In respect to the frequency of verbal parental aggression, neither respondent’s gender, F _{(1, 497)} = .77, p = .382, nor the interaction of respondent’s gender × type of aggression, F _{(3, 497)} = .206, p = .892, had an effect on the dependent variable. Type of aggression had a significant effect on the dependent variable, frequency of verbal parental aggression, F _{(3, 497)} = 79.73, p = .000. In respect to the frequency of physical parental aggression, respondent’s gender, F _{(1, 497)} = 5.85, p = .016, and type of aggression, F _{(3, 497)} = 107.44, p = .000, had significant effects on the dependent variable. The interaction of respondent’s gender × type of aggression had no effect on the frequency of physical aggression, F _{(3, 497)} = 2.50, p = .059.

Table 1.

Main and Interaction Effects of Respondent’s Gender and Type of Aggression (Only Paternal, Only Maternal, or Both Parents) on the Frequency of Verbal and Physical Parental Aggression.

Main and Interaction Effects	F	df	η ²
Frequency of verbal parental aggression
Respondent’s gender	.77	1, 497	.002
Type of aggression	79.73***	3, 497	.328
Respondent’s gender × Type of aggression	.206	3, 497	.001
Frequency of physical parental aggression
Respondent’s gender	5.85*	1, 497	.012
Type of aggression	107.44***	3, 497	.397
Respondent’s gender × Type of aggression	2.50	3, 497	.015

Note. * p < .05, *** p < .001.

As shown in Figure 2, according to the tenth hypothesis, the frequency of verbal paternal aggression against the child (only maternal: M = 0.793, SE = .668; only paternal: M = 0.714, SE = .536; both parents: M = 1.290, SE = .757) was higher than the frequency of physical paternal aggression (only maternal: M = 0.357, SE = .511; only paternal: M = 0.277, SE = .216; both parents: M = 0.596, SE = .506). According to the eleventh hypothesis, the frequency of physical parental aggression—across all types of aggression—experienced by daughters (M = 0.469, SE = .519) was higher than the frequency of physical parental aggression experienced by sons (M = 0.391, SE = .302).

Figure 2.

Comparison of mean scores for frequency of verbal and physical parental aggression by type of aggression (only maternal, only paternal, or both parents) and respondent’s gender.

Discussion

This study provides further information on the gender-specific particularities of parent-to-child aggressive behavior by including all possible parent–child gender-constellations and addressing two common forms of parental aggression (i.e., verbal and physical) in one study. This approach allows this study to address some of the limitations of the knowledge available from previous research, some of which were conducted more than 30 years ago. This work adds recent findings from a community sample of young academics, living in a modern liberal society, most of which grew up in families exposed to all the societal changes in gender-roles and gender-perceptions of the last decades. The results presented here show, above all, that parental aggression is still very prevalent today. Three-quarters of the respondents have experienced parental aggression during their years at middle school, roughly between the ages 12 to 15. About one quarter experienced physical parental aggression, in virtually all those cases along with verbal aggression, and about half of the respondents experienced exclusively verbal parental aggression. In other words: Only one-quarter of the young Israeli academics in this sample lived thru their years of early adolescence and puberty without suffering verbal or physical parental aggression. Furthermore, the results show that parental aggressive behavior differs between mothers and daughters, mothers and sons, fathers and daughters, and fathers and sons. The data did not support all the hypotheses, which were based on the existing knowledge. Nevertheless, the results provide evidence of the relevance of gender and gender-constellation in the context of parental verbal and physical aggression. The significance of these results, within the sample of this study, will be discussed in the following paragraphs.

Parental Aggressive Behavior and Parent’s Gender

With mothers prone to spend more time with their children than fathers (Huerta et al., 2013), and with women showing elevated tendencies towards aggressive behavior in emotionally close relationships (Cross et al., 2011; Kring, 2010), it was hypothesized that the participants in this study will report more incidents of maternal aggression than paternal aggression. Furthermore, with women’s overall tendency to express more verbal aggression (Björkqvist, 2018), and men to express more physical aggression (Ellis et al., 2008), it was hypothesized that this difference will be more pronounced for verbal aggression. The results, however, showed little difference between maternal and paternal aggression overall, with paternal aggression exceeding maternal aggression. While those differences were slim, the largest of them was paternal verbal aggression to exceed maternal verbal aggression and the smallest was paternal physical aggression to exceed maternal physical aggression. Incidents of only paternal aggression were higher than only maternal aggression.

It can be assumed that with children attending middle school, the overtime of maternal presence is smaller than with younger children, leveling off the effect of mothers’ greater obligation to deal with challenges of child-discipline at younger ages—a phenomenon reported in several previous studies (Gelles, 1989; Lansford et al., 2010). Males’ general tendency to be more aggressive (Hyde, 2005), shows here in the larger number of cases where only the father was aggressive to the child. Considering that in a modern liberal society—like Israel—physical aggression is considered inappropriate and is even forbidden by law, it is reasonable to assume that this tendency accounts in this study for fathers’ proneness to verbal aggression but shows much less in respect to physical aggression.

It is worth mentioning, that parental aggression by both parents accounts for 75.3% in the case of verbal aggression but only 46.5% in the case of physical aggression. This points toward another phenomenon revealed by this study: While verbal parental aggression is mainly a characteristic of the parental subsystem (both parents are verbally aggressive), physical parental aggression is to a much larger proportion a characteristic of one particular parent (either the mother or the father is physically aggressive). Possibly, verbal aggression is more an expression of problematic system-dynamics, an overall poisonous family climate, manifesting in generalized patterns of detriment communication. Physical aggression, on the other hand, seems to be more an expression of individual problems, like inapt emotional regulation, or antisocial personality traits, manifesting in violent acts against one’s own child. In other words: The lesser severity of parental aggression (verbal aggression) is more likely to be reached by both parents, while the more severe parental aggression (physical aggression) may take some additional individual disturbance on the parent’s side to be reached.

Parental Aggressive Behavior and Child’s Gender

Considerably more male than female respondents were exposed to parental aggressive behavior during their years at middle school. This difference was more pronounced for physical aggression than for verbal aggression. This means that parental aggression in this study is regulated to some degree by child’s gender, with parents showing more reluctance to enact aggression against their daughters than against their sons. This finding is congruent with several previous studies (refer to Gershoff, 2002).

One might consider explaining this phenomenon by the possibly greater physical aggression originating from the male child himself (Archer, 2004; Card et al., 2008), thereby “eliciting” his parents’ harsh parenting strategies, including verbal and/or physical aggression in return. While such explanations are intelligible and can be found in literature (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1978; Parke & Slaby, 1983), they are somewhat dated and highly controversial. Gershoff (2002) compares this controversy with the chicken-and-egg problem and asks: “Are boys spanked more because they are aggressive, or are they more aggressive because they are spanked more?” While more recent studies have shown that child’s behavior and child’s characteristics can explain mild to medium corporal punishment to some degree, they have also shown these effects to be limited and mediated by other factors (for a further discussion refer to Boutwell et al., 2011; Jaffee et al., 2004). It is, therefore, more reasonable to assume that either child’s gender or parent–child gender-constellations, and possibly even additional contextual circumstances, influence parents’ assessment of the appropriateness of aggressive behavior against either their daughters or their sons. Parents might, for example, perceive boys as tougher and stronger, and, especially physically, as less vulnerable than girls. In turn, this might lead parents to be more unwary in their choice of disciplining strategies with their sons than with their daughters.

Parental Aggressive Behavior and Gender-constellation

When analyzing the data by both, parent’s and child’s gender, it becomes apparent that parental aggression differs between the distinct gender-constellations. For both, verbal and physical aggression, mothers account for more incidents against sons than fathers, and fathers account for more incidents against daughters than mothers. Focusing on those cases where only one parent exhibited aggressive behavior towards the child, only maternal verbal aggression is comparably common against daughters and sons, but only paternal verbal aggression is almost three times as common against daughters than against sons. Only maternal physical aggression is considerably less common against daughters than against sons, and only paternal physical aggression is more than three times as common against daughters than against sons.

Given the inconsistent scientific background on this matter (e.g., Das Eiden et al., 2001; Hallers-Haalboom et al., 2016; Kochanska et al., 2009; McKee et al., 2007), these results do not allow to draw specific conclusions. Nevertheless, it is striking that in this study, opposite gender-constellations show the highest counts of incidents of parental aggression. Paternal aggression against daughters (verbal and physical) and physical maternal aggression against sons obviously represent distinct patterns not yet understood. One might speculate, that mothers and fathers have different expectations from daughters than from sons. In addition, mothers and fathers might have a different expectation from themselves, from their own—maternal or paternal—role, depending on the child’s gender. In other words, being a daughter’s mother might be perceived as a completely different role than being a son’s mother and being a son’s father a different role than being a daughter’s father. A father, for example, might perceive this paternal role to his daughter as being her protector and guardian, while he perceives his paternal role to his son as being his facilitator and motivator.

The Intensity of Parental Aggressive Behavior and Gender

With neither respondent’s gender nor the interaction of respondent’s gender showing any significance in the inferential analysis, only the differences between the frequencies of parental aggression against both children can be used to further understand the phenomenon expressed in the data. They show that verbal aggression is much more frequent than physical aggression. This holds true for only maternal, only paternal and parental aggression from both parents. For both forms of aggression, the intensity of maternal aggression is somewhat higher than for paternal aggression. It is reasonable to assume, that this is in part the result of greater maternal involvement in childrearing as compared to fathers’ involvement. Further conclusions cannot yet be drawn conscientiously based on the data presented here. However, one might presume that there is a fundamental difference between the parental decision if to enact violence against the child as opposed to the decision when to enact violence against the child. While the findings of this research indicate that gender and gender-interactions are part of the dynamics leading to the decision if to enact violence against the child, they suggest that—once this principle decision is made—the dynamics leading to the decision when to enact violence against the child are governed by different factors and considerations.

The Limitations of the Current Study

The current study utilized a sample of university students in northern Israel in which more than three quarters were female, 40% not Jewish, 60% somewhat traditional or religious, and 90% middle to upper-middle class. The sample was somewhat disproportionately educated, female, non-Jewish, religious, and middle-class than the general population. Both the underrepresentation of males and the ethnical bias might reduce the capability of the current study to identify further details of gender-differences in respect to parent-to-child aggression. The generalizability of this study’s findings might therefore be limited.

The current study did not account for other forms of aggressive behavior in the family, but verbal and physical aggression. Individual characteristics of the respondent and her or his family, such as physical health, number of siblings, parental divorce, living arrangements, and the like, were not addressed. It is therefore advisable, that future research should account for these variables to further understand gender-differences in parent-to-child aggression.

Some of the research literature stresses the importance of culture and social norms in respect to the issue investigated. The limitations of the findings presented here may be due to the lack of these aspects included within the analysis. Most notably, without reference to culture, the impact of deviations of the actual parental behavior from behavior expected by gender-related norms, could not be addressed. However, some points concerning the impact of culture and social norms on parental aggression in Israel shall be mentioned here. First, in Israel, corporal punishment of children was prohibited by law since the year 2000 (Schuz, 2003). Second, Jewish, Muslim, and Christian religious leaders and scholars—the three major religions represented in Israel—which have advocated corporal punishment of children in the past, gradually change their approach since the last two decades. Today, most of them do not support corporal punishment any longer, and many forbid it decisively (Guttmann, Lazar & Makhoul, 2009; Kaplan, 2006). Overall, in the Israeli public opinion, child maltreatment and parental aggression are perceived as inappropriate and are widely disapproved (Benbenishty & Schmid, 2013). All those developments are consistent and show a general trend towards the banishment of parental aggression. One manifestation of this trend is the steady decline of cases of child maltreatment in Israel (Israel National Council for the Child, 2018). Nevertheless, it is strongly suggested that further studies should account for cultural and social factors as possible mediators between gender and/or gender-constellation and parental aggression.

Summary and Final Comments

This study investigated parental aggressive behavior from a perspective of gender and gender-constellations between parent and children at the ages 12 to 15. The results show that gender is a meaningful category in parental aggressive behavior. They also reveal that distinct gender-constellations show specific behavioral patterns regarding verbal and physical parental aggression. While overall more fathers than mothers exhibit aggression against their child, the differences between them were slim. Verbal parental aggression was found to be connected more to characteristics of the parental subsystem (both parents), but physical parental aggression was found to be connected more to individual characteristics of a specific parent. Significant differences were found between sons and daughters, with sons experiencing more parental aggression of any form. Other-gender gender-constellations showed to result more often in parental aggression, than same-gender gender-constellations, with only marginal differences between maternal verbal aggression against daughters and sons. Furthermore, the findings suggest that certain high-conflict constellations involving individual parents prone to aggression and individual children, are characterized by higher frequencies of parental aggression.

The findings of this study underline the relevance of gender and gender-constellations and show with recent data drawn from a non-clinical sample, that previous research results need to be re-evaluated and updated. Cultural and societal variables should be further examined as well, as individual and familial characteristics. These findings may be useful for professionals who should consider gender and gender-constellations in their assessment of families presenting issues of parental aggression. Such issues may be especially valuable where gender-constellations are exclusive, for example, in single-parent families or families with same-sex parents, or when gender-issues are more pronounced, for example, during puberty.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

David Mehlhausen-Hassoen

Author Biography

David Mehlhausen-Hassoen, PhD, is lecturer at the School of Social Work and Researcher at the Center for Research and Study of the Family. He is a Social Worker, a certified couple’s and family Therapist and Supervisor. He specializes in the dynamics of family systems, focusing on conflict, gender-interactions, abuse and violence, and divorce.

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