How common is it for a woman to be the abuser in domestic violence situations?

Question

I know they say that it's almost always the man abusing the woman or, at worst, it's a "mutual combatant" situation but are there any stats on how often women abuse men?

Answer 1

Women as the abusers isn't as common as men but it is happening out there every day. Most men won't turn her in for fear of ridicule. Its very sad.
http://home.earthlink.net/~elnunes/soa.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2003-06-22-abuse-usat_x.htm
http://home.earthlink.net/~elnunes/abuse.htm
Check out these web sites, they have some good info.

Answer 2

The stats for women are tougher because many of them use the 'passive aggressive' form . . . they are either verbally snide or insulting or refuse to communicate. They will doing things like deliberately spend all the $$ or spit in the man's serving of food. Although a few engage in mutual combat, most know they would loose that fight, so they resort to what are called the passive tactics so the police are not usually called and the stats do not develop.
Note: although the overt physical abuse is quick and evident, the passive abuses may be more damaging relationship wise, because the person tolerates them longer, trying to make things better (although it generally gets worse and the guy becomes physically ill from stress)

Answer 3

Definitive statistics on this would be very hard to find given that not all abuse cases are reported.
That aside I found this article on studies into spousal abuse:
(Please note that this is quite an old report, but still fascinating reading)

Straus et al. (1980) reported that out of a nationally representative sample of 2,143 couples in 1975, 28% had experienced violence at some point in their marriage, and 16% had experienced violence within the past year.
In nearly half of those families, the abuse was mutual (i.e., both spouses had committed a violent act).
Of the remaining couples, the husband alone was violent in 27.7% of the cases, while the wife alone was violent in 22.7%. Only slight differences between husbands and wives were found in the annual incidence rates of overall violence - 12.1 per 100 husbands compared to 11.6 per 100 wives.
When examining severe violence, women were more violent than men.
Severe wife-to-husband violence occured in 4.6 out of 100 families, while the rate for severe husband-to-wife violence was 3.8 out of 100 families

Ten years later (1990), the overall rate of violence by husbands had declined slightly, but violence by wives showed a small increase. Straus and Gelles (1986) in a telephone survey of 3,520 households, discovered that the rate of overall violence by husbands dropped to 11.3 (from 12.1), while wife-to-husband violence rose to 12.1 (from 11.6).

Abuse by women or men is bad enough but worse still is the rising incidence of physical abuse on the elderly.

Answer 4

I see you received a lot of skewed proportions to your question. Think; it any such type of violence/abuse the proportion of males perpetrating it is so much greater than the female perpetrator proportion, that it is almost not a matter of degree, but kind. Social science fallacies aside; look at the ethnographic data for all classes of abuse/violence. Why for this particular category would there be a difference? I think I can smell an ideological reason, I just do not know whether it is male or female ideology's who are perpetrating this bit of nonsense.

Answer 5

We I know my husband's ex-wife used to hit him, she was also a black-belt in karate. Even though he has a black-belt as well, he would never hit a woman.

My other point would be that men rarely will admit to being abused and we have to rely on statistics that are based on reported crime. Women will report domestic abuse much more readily than men in general so it's difficult to know if the 'facts' tie in with reality.

Overall women are not commonly the abusers - but it's not unheard of.

Answer 6

Most men don't report the abuse for fear of being mocked or laughed at. I know because a friend of mine that is a social worker told me so. But there must be info or stats at police stations.

Answer 7

Speaking from experience after being abused i started being the abuser but it didn't feel good inside so i got some counseling that helped. I believe any body who's abusive can change they just have to do something about it like counseling.

Answer 8

1-3% in most countries' statistics, while the average of male abusers is around 30-40% concerning physical abusing. Of course this refers to the cases when a person experienced violence at least once in her life.

Answer 9

i'm a kin violence counselor. whilst i began interior the sector i theory that it replaced into in all probability 50/50 (or much extra like 60/40). What I even have discovered is that maximum persons of adult adult males are the commonplace aggressor. If a woman is charged with kin violence it somewhat is virtually constantly some style of retaliation. females who're in kin violence circumstances oftentimes will the two withdraw emotionally and could act as "time-honored" victims, or will start to style the habit of their companion and could lash out on the companion or (extra oftentimes) their infants. I even have attended distinctive trainings by potential of regulation enforcement and leaders interior the psychological well being field that help this theory, that adult adult males are virtually constantly the commonplace aggressor quite for actual abuse. it somewhat is extra ordinary for a woman to alter into verbally or psychologically abusive, then bodily. females even tend in charge themselves and admit abuse extra many times. meaning that if a guy tells his spouse she is a whore, and he or she slaps him around the face, and he punches her interior the arm the story she will inform the police is: "he stated as me a acceptance so I slapped him." And the story he will tell the police is "I have not any clue why she slapped me around the face, she only went loopy, so i attempted to calm her down and get her off me. It replaced into self protection" adult adult males down play the abuse or use excuses like, "she is bi-polar." i somewhat believe from my adventure counseling the two adult adult males and girls that an overpowering majority of the "genuine" victims are females and the "genuine" perpetrators are adult adult males.

Answer 10

they don't keep many stats on battery by women to men. I had a case when I was a social worker that a man was wheelchair bound, skrawny and helpless. He was getting beat by his wife regularly and had no family or friends to call on. I couldn't get help for him though because he was a man..... It's called women's equality. Ofcourse you have to remember that a cruel and unreasonable comment from a man to his wife like,"that steak was a little salty, hun." is considered abusive by the femi-nazis.

Answer 11

Actually, I think it is about equal. I don't have stats, but it seems women are just as capable as men of being abusers.

women might not hurt men as bad, depending on their size and physical strength. also, women can be verbally or emotionally abusive or find subtle ways to hurt people without it being obvious to outsiders.