Yaar, Daniella (4/12) The relationship between childhood maltreatment and adult aggressive behaviors: understanding the context of violence (Nicholas Papouchis, Ph.D.; Lisa Samstag, Ph.D.; Sara Haden, Ph.D.)
The current study conducted a broad exploration of the relationship between experiences of childhood maltreatment and aggression, by introducing multiple mediating variables including object relations, emotion dysregulation, and empathy. One hundred and ten participants who endorsed histories of childhood maltreatment were recruited via Craigslist. The sample was composed of 110 male and female participants, 70 (63.6%) female and 40 (36.4%) male, with ages of the participants ranging from 18 to 65 ( M =36.64, SD = 13.09). The sample was racially and ethnically diverse with: 35 (31.8%) Caucasian, 21 (19.1%) Black, 16 (14.5%) African American, 13 (11.8%) Asian, nine (8.2%) Hispanic, and 16 (14.5%) other. The study used a path analysis to test a proposed model of aggression, comparing a mediated and a nonmediated submodel. In addition, the study examined premeditated (PM) and impulsive (IA) aggression would exhibit distinct relationships with measures of empathy and emotion dysregulation. The proposed full path model was found to be a good fit for the data (χ 2 (4, N = 110) = 6.8, p = .15, RMSEA = .08, NFI = .955, and AIC = 38.82). Significant direct effects were noted between emotion dysregulation and aggression, object relations and emotion dysregulation, and emotion dysregulation and empathy. The study also found a significant indirect effect between object relations and aggression. Counter to the hypothesis, the Impulse scale on the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS) exhibited a significant relationship with PM. In their continuous form, PD (personal distress) only exhibited a significant relationship IA. These findings demonstrate that a broad understanding of the complex relationship between childhood maltreatment and aggression is an important undertaking with useful clinical implications.
