Adolescents Who Are Violent Toward Their Parents: An Approach to the Situation in Chile
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Date
2021
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Abstract
Child-to-parent violence has been defined as any act used by children to
gain power and control by generating fear in their parents and that seeks
to cause physical, psychological, and/or financial harm to their parents. This
behavior puts family safety at risk due to the imbalance of power that it
generates. For this reason, most abused parents feel guilty and humiliated.
Child-to-parent violence has been historically underresearched compared
with other studies about family violence. Most of the research conducted
on this topic has been carried out in Europe and North America in the
least decades. Nevertheless, in Chile, the research about child-to-parent
violence has been really insufficient. This article presents the first analysis
conducted in Chile regarding the prevalence of violent adolescent behavior
toward parents. A total of 1,861 adolescents between the ages of 13 and
20 (M = 16.1, SD = 1.29) participated in the study (48.1% boys; 51.9% girls).
Participants answered an ad hoc questionnaire on child-to-parent violence.
Our findings indicate that psychological, economic, and physical aggression
against the mother was more frequent than against the father. Daughters are
more likely to use psychological aggression toward their fathers and mothers,
whereas sons are more likely to use financial and physical aggression. Young
people living in single-parent families are more likely to use financial and psychological aggression toward their mother. These findings reveal the
impact of gender and family structure on aggression toward parents.
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Keywords
Child-to-parent aggression, Domestic violence, Family violence, Adolescents