UNH Magazine Winter 01 - Murray Straus feature

Cover photo
by Gary Samson

Safe at Home?
(Continued from previous page)

Illustration by Diane Fenster

The scales measure the extent to which each of three tactics is used to resolve conflict within the family: reasoning, verbal aggression, and physical aggression or violence. For example, "discussed an issue calmly" is one of six reasoning tactics. "Insulted or swore at him/her" is one of eight possible verbal-aggression responses. "Kicked, bit or hit him/her with a fist" is one of 12 violent responses.

In 1975, Straus and his researchers conducted face-to-face interviews with a nationally representative sample of 2,146 people who were married or living with a partner of the opposite sex. The goals of this first National Family Violence Survey were to find out what proportion of American families were violent, how extensive the violence was (including behavior that is not usually considered violent, such as spanking), what the violence meant to the participants and what caused the violence to occur.

They found that in 28 percent of marriages, either the husband or wife or both had resorted to hitting at least once. The survey was repeated 10 years later, in 1985, and parts were repeated in 1992 and 1995.

The years between the surveys brought some significant changes. "We found a substantial reduction in assaults by men on women, but no change in the rate of assaults by women on men," says Straus, who attributes the difference, in part, to public awareness of male batterers, coupled with a cultural acceptance of a woman "slapping the cad."

Instead of taking the usual path of publishing their survey results in sociological journals, Straus and Gelles actively disseminated the data to the general public. "When working on issues that affect people's lives directly, it's important to get the results out," Straus says. "Contrary to what used to be the case in sociology, we encourage people in the lab to talk to reporters and make contacts that will enable people to know what we've found out."

Straus and his colleagues had delved into an area that was historically taboo: what goes on behind closed doors. "Even raising the issue of family violence was controversial in the beginning," says Wheaton College sociology professor Kersti Yllo '77G, '80G, another former Straus student. "It undermined the images of the family that are held dear in our society. Murray followed his nose and found more and more. He is a superb quantitative researcher."

Other sociologists have criticized Straus for his eagerness to publish his research results in the mainstream media. "He may be communicating with the media in a way that emphasizes his perspective before the data can be critiqued by his peers," says Robert Larzelere, research scientist at Girls and Boys Town in Nebraska, who did post-doctoral work with Straus. But he adds that Straus is always open to the ideas of others, even when they disagree with him. Giles-Sims concurs. "One thing I really respect Murray for is that he is so open about different kinds of research," she says.

And many people who work with children and families in trouble, including Larzelere, recognize that Straus has been instrumental in raising public awareness of vitally important issues. "Having respected data was very important to the feminist movement and important in getting funding and support for the Violence Against Women Act," states Yllo. British psychologist and child advocate Penelope Leach states that Straus' "decent, repeatable statistics" have been an important tool in her work.

At the Center of the Storm
A well-dressed, diminutive man, Straus' easy smile and approachable demeanor seem at odds with his field of research. And he seems an unlikely person to find at the center of the controversies sparked by his revelation of the amount of pushing, hitting, slapping, burning, choking and kicking that goes on in ordinary homes.

In the early 1970s, Straus wrote a series of articles on the topic of battered women and wife beating, which were used extensively by feminists to demonstrate the need for battered women's shelters. Then, when Straus and Gelles conducted the first National Family Violence Survey, they found that wives are just as likely to hit their husbands as vice versa--and often women are the first to strike out. "I was excommunicated as a feminist," Straus says. The data was troubling, especially in light of the fact that women are injured in domestic disputes seven times as often as men, and women are twice as likely to be killed.