A grounded theory exploration of parent-to-child verbal aggression and development of an integrative theoretical model for understanding recipient impact

This qualitative study explored 10 (5 female; 5 male) American adults' subjective appraisals of their childhood and adulthood functional---cognitive, emotional, physiological, and behavioral---responses to childhood episodes of parent-to-child verbal aggression, including coping responses, and how this form of aggression impacted, and continues to impact, their intra- and inter-relationships. Results of this study revealed that, in their adulthood, recipients of childhood episodes of parent-to-child verbal aggression appraise themselves as having been, and continuing to be, negatively impacted by their childhood experiences of verbally aggressive parenting behavior---specifically in the form of childhood and adulthood uncomfortable, threatening, and/or trauma-like cognitive, emotional, physiological, and behavioral responses and maladaptive intra- and inter-relational experiences. With the use of grounded theory methods for data collection and analysis, an integrative theoretical model was developed, which describes: (a) the causal condition of childhood episodes of parent-to-child verbal aggression, (b) contextual and intervening conditions [including cultural and sub-cultural norms and risk and protective factors] that influenced participants' actions and interactions in response to childhood episodes of parent-to-child verbal aggression, (c) the inter-reactive "web" of attack on human functioning and relating that occurred via childhood episodes of parent-to-child verbal aggression, (d) long-term consequences in the form of adulthood repetition and/or maintenance of inter-reactive "web" of attack on human functioning and relating: "stuck on the web," and (e) means of reprieval from adulthood inter-reactive "web" of attack on human functioning and relating [i.e., adulthood emotion- and problem-focused coping strategies]. Subcategories of each component of the integrative theoretical model, and relations between subcategories and categories (or components of the model), were identified and illustrated by narrative data. Clinical implications indicating a need for an integrative approach to assessment and intervention with recipients of parent-to-child verbal aggression are discussed, as well as suggestions for future research. Additionally, an instrument that allows for the assessment of exposure to a wide range of verbally aggressive parenting behaviors was developed for, and is presented within, this study. Although internal reliability and validity coefficients for this instrument have yet to be established, its development was based on current research and, in part, existing measures.