Exposure To Intimate Partner Violence And Problem Behavior: A Meta-analysis And Relationship Research

Numerous researches showed that intimate partner violence has become a more common social problem.But for a long time,the researchers pay attention to the study of direct victims of intimate partner violence exposure,however,when intimate partner violence occurs,women are not the only victims of violence,children are also victims.And because the negative effect of children’s exposure to intimate partner violence is concealed,it is not easy to be found in a short time,thus it is not easy to be taken seriously by researchers.In fact,as the main environment of individual growth,family has a significant influence on the development of individual psychology and behavior.And exposure to intimate partner violence does have a profound impact on the behavior development of individuals,when exposed to intimate partner violence environment,individuals are more prone to anxiety,depression,sleep disorders,aggressive behavior and other problems,therefore,the impact of exposure to intimate partner violence on adolescent problem behavior deserves to be paid attention.Studies on the negative effects of exposure to intimate partner violence on children began in the1980 s,and most of them have confirmed the relationship between intimate partner violence exposure and children’s internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors.However,it is not difficult to find that there exists significant differences between previous empirical studies,due to the distinctive features of each researcher’s research in research design,measuring tools,participants selection,sample size,measurement index and statistical methods,etc.,and it is also difficult to evaluate and to judge whether these results are good or bad.Meta-analysis is an appropriate statistical method for quantitative review of these results.Consequently,the first study will systematically evaluate and analyze the dependent studies discussing the relationship between exposure to intimate partner violence and individual problem behaviors between 2007-2019.And participants’ gender and age will be included as moderated variables during the Meta-analysis,which is helpful to analyze the reasons for the inconsistency of effect size among the existing empirical studies,this provides a better understanding of the relationship between exposure to intimate partner violence and individuals problem behavior.The first research of my paper conducted a meta-analytic review of studies that examined the influence of exposure to intimate partner violence on individual problem behavior,and focus on the role of moderating variables in the relationship between exposure to intimate partner violence and individual problem behavior.Data from 34 journal articles and 95 effect sizes with 12681 participants revealed that exposure to intimate partner violence had significant effects on individual internalizing problem behaviors,externalizing problem behaviors and overall problem behaviors,and the effect sizes were 0.19,0.18 and 0.19,respectively.In addition,the gender of the participants played a significant role in moderating the relationship between exposure to intimate partner violence and externalizing problem behaviors,as well as overall problem behaviors,and as the proportion of male participants increased,the effect size between exposure to intimate partner violence and externalizing problem behavior,overall problem behavior also increased significantly;however,there was no significant moderating effect between exposure to intimate partner violence and internalizing problem behavior.There were significant moderating effects of participants’ age on exposure to intimate partner violence and individual internalizing problem behaviors,externalizing problem behaviors,and overall problem behaviors,the effect size of adult group was significantly higher than that of adolescent group,children group and infant group,and the effect size of infant group was significantly higher than that of children group and infant group.The meta-analysis emphasized the influence of exposure to intimate partner violence on individual problem behavior,but the underlying mechanism of the influence of exposure to intimate partner violence on individual problem behavior remains to be discussed.Previous studies have examined the mediating effects of maternal depression,maternal stress and other factors on exposure to intimate partner violence and individual problem behavior based on spillover theory,less attention has been paid to the role of individual factors in this relationship.Therefore,the second study of this paper is based on the meta-analysis and under the guidance of cognitive-background theory,emotional security theory and so on,to explore the mediating role of general self-efficacy between exposure to intimate partner violence and individual problem behaviors.The results of the second study showed that general self-efficacy played a mediating role between exposure to intimate partner violence and internalizing problem behavior,and the mediating effect was 0.02,accounting for 11.1% of the total effect.The mediating effect between exposure to intimate partner violence and externalizing problem behavior was 0.02,accounting for 7.1% of the total effect.In summary,both meta-analysis and correlation studies found significant effects of exposure to intimate partner violence on internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors,what’s more,general self-efficacy played a significant mediating role between exposure to intimate partner violence and individual problem behaviors.