Understanding and Preventing Violence, Volume 3 Social Influences (1994) / Chapter Skim
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Gender and Interpersonal Violence
Gender and Interpersonal Violence
Pages 293-376
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From page 293... ...
For almost four decades now, men have dominated official reports of violent crime and, regardless of the data source, they appear to engage disproportionately in the most injurious acts of interpersonal violence. Race differences produce some variations among different data sets; gender differences, however, appear and reappear across time and different social contexts in crimes of violence and acts of aggression.
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From page 294... ...
We begin by defining the concepts that provide the framework for this analysis. DEFINITIONS AND CONCEPTS The Panel on the Understanding and Control of Violent Behavior limits its consideration of violent human behavior to interpersonal violence, which is defined as behavior that "threatens, attempts, or actually inflicts physical harm." This definition of violence is composed of the following three elements: {l)
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From page 295... ...
Similarly, models predicting sex differences in interpersonal violence can be misspecified when they fad! to include biological variables; conversely, a gender-based explanation of violence should mode!
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From page 296... ...
Uniform Crime Reports Perhaps the best-known data for assessing gender differences in interpersonal violence in the United States are the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)
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From page 297... ...
These computations were derived from Steffensmeier's extensive work on UCR data and gender differences in arrest rates isee Steffensmeier et al., 1979, 1989; Steffensmeier, 1980, 1982; Steffensmeier and Alian, 1988; Steffensmeier and Streifel, 19891. First, 1988 arrest data from UCR were combined with census data to compute offense arrest rates that take into account sex distributions in the population.2 Because few people under the age of 10 commit crimes, the rates are calculated for persons age 10 years and older {or for the population at riskl.
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From page 298... ...
Table 1 presents violent crime arrest rates for mates and femaTes for 1988. First, it appears that the mate rate of arrest for index violent crimes is about seven times higher than the female rate.
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From page 299... ...
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From page 300... ...
The final UCR data we present for 1988 involve an analysis of arrest rates for violent crimes by residence {urban and rural) and gender.4 Here we find that, regardless of gender, arrest rates are higher in urban than in rural areas and that, regardless of residence' the arrest rates of males again far exceed those of females Isee Table 31.
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From page 301... ...
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From page 302... ...
They reveal not only the degree to which violent crime offending and victimization covary within the same gender and age groups, but in examining the perceived characteristics of offenders, they can also help to validate the patterns observed in UCR data. We begin by presenting victimization rates, for 1987, for the three crimes of violence by gender.6 Table 4 reveals that, with the exception of rape, mates are more likely to be the victims of crimir~al violence than females.
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From page 303... ...
Attempted and completed violent crime victimizations peak in the mid- to late teens for men {ages 16-19) and in the early twenties for women.
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From page 305... ...
Although these aggregate violent crime victimization rates for metro women and nonmetro men are significantly influenced by the skewed gender distribution of rape cases, comparable data appear for robbery rates. A Closer Look at the Data Thus far, the NCS and UCR data on violent crime by gender suggest a considerable degree of parity between victims and offenders.
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From page 306... ...
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From page 307... ...
First, these data indicate that only about one-half of all violent crimes are reported to the police and that females are slightly more likely than mates to report being victimized. Gender-based discrepancies in reporting are particularly notable in the case of robbery j47.5 and 69.6% of the victimizations are reported by men and women, respectively)
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From page 308... ...
, the more property a rapist steals and the more serious the physical injury, the more likely it is that the victim will report. Hence with the considerable amount of attention given to the handling of rape cases by criminal justice personnel over the past decade
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From page 309... ...
analyses of the National Center for Health Statistics data for 1975 confirmed Letcher's finding and further suggested the following rank ordering of homicide victimization rates for the four race-sex groups: nonwhite mates, nonwhite females, white mates and white femaTes. Mann's jl987J ongoing field research, which involves collecting data from centralized homicide files in the police departments of Chicago, Houston, and Atlanta, also reveals that, of the women arrested for murder, black women are found predominantly in cleared murder cases.
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From page 310... ...
arrest rates reveal the same rank ordering by race and gender as previously noted. Offense rates for black females, although closest to those for white mates, actually exceed offense rates for both white mates and white females.
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From page 311... ...
. Taken together, both official incidence and self-report data paint a very consistent picture of the relationship between gender and interpersonal violence.
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From page 312... ...
To address these issues, Table 9 presents data from three decades {1960, 1977, 19881 on male and female arrest rates {per 100,000) and the female percentage of total arrests tfF/A} tor violent crime.8 The 1960 and 1977 data are extracted from previous research ISteffensmeier et al., 19791, and the 1988 data appear in Table 1.
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From page 313... ...
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From page 314... ...
Not surprisingly, TABLE 10 Adolescent Female Percentage of Arrests jFP/A) to Total Arrests Rates for Violent Crimes in 1965,1977, and 1988 Type of Crime 1960 ~1977a 198sb Murder 6.3 8.6 7.2 Robbery 4.6 7.4 6.7 Aggravated assault 13.0 15.4 13.4 Other assaults 16.3 21.3 19.7 aFrom Steffensmeier and Steffensmeier {1980:Table 1l, 10-17 year olds.
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From page 315... ...
An important qualification to this "lifestyle" explanation of gender differences and changes in violent crime victimization rates can be found in the work of Gartner and her colleagues {19871. Their study is also one of the few longitudinal analyses of v~ct~mization rates that employs cross-cultural data.
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From page 316... ...
The general tendency to exclude female offenders from longitudinal research on delinquency and antisocial behavior may be due, at least in part, to the greater frequency of violent offending among males. However' even among those studies that contain both males and females in the sample populations, the respondent's gender is often ignored; the researchers simply fait to disaggregate the data by gender E.g., see Hamparian et al., 19781.
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From page 317... ...
However, that panel's analysis of gender variation in the individual frequencies for active offenders led it to conclude that active female offenders commit crime at rates similar to those of active mates {Blumstein et al., 1986:671. By contrast, Weiner {1989:82)
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From page 318... ...
suggested, if there is substantially less gender variation in frequency of offending than there is in participation, the large differences found between males and females in aggregate arrest rates may simply be due to differences that arise from gender-based variation in participation rates iBlumstein et al., 1986:67; see also Fagan, 19901. Whether this hypothesis can be generalized to nonwhites and adult violent offenders also warrants further exploration.
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From page 319... ...
Male gang members in Los Angeles also reported some female involvement in violent gang activities; nevertheless, females were excluded from most of the economic criminal activity ;Bowker et al., 1980~. A contrasting view of the role and activities of female gang ~A 1975 members occurs In concurrent and subsequent studies.
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From page 320... ...
Citizen Reports of Violent Crime As we have seen, the primary source of information used in examining gender-related rates of, and trends in, interpersonal violence are police generated arrest statistics that appear annually in the Uniform Crime Reports. Gender differences in officially recorded criminal activity could be biased if citizens fait to notify the police when the offense involves a female or if, once notified, the police are less likely to arrest female suspects.
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From page 321... ...
. Further, although several scholars have speculated that changes in law enforcement practices may account for notable increases in female arrest rates for property offenses fRans, 1978; Krohn et al., 1983; Steffensmeier and Streifel, 19891, few have focused on violent offenses.
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From page 322... ...
factors. Although the analysis did not include female offenders, the results point to police bias in cases involving female and nonwhite victims.
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From page 323... ...
Third, and finally, analyses of short-term trends in crime and delinquency suggest that rates of discovery of crime by police and arrest rates are both increasing over time IMenard, 19871; we have no evidence that this increased efficiency on the part of the police systematically excludes female offenders ;Steffensmeier and Streifel, 19891. The preceding analysis has put together pieces of relevant in
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From page 324... ...
.~3 The important question before us then is why women are so much less likely than men to be involved in acts of interpersonal violence. CAUSES AND CORRELATES IN GENDER AND VIOLENCE EXPLANATIONS FOR GENDER DIFFERENCES IN INTERPERSONAL VIOLENCE It is now well known that research and policy directed toward female offenders lags far behind that on mate offenders {Klein, 1973; Smart, 1976; Datesman and Scarpitti, 1980; Leonard, 1982; Kruttschnitt and Johnson, 1984; Naffine, 1987~.
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From page 325... ...
the organizing and activating functions of hormones in aggression among humans remains unclear {Tieger, 1980:951; White, 1983:6-7; Siann, 1985:33-36; Widom and Ames, 1988:316-322~; and {4) although observational research on aggression among young children provides some support for a biological basis for sex differences, developmental research suggests that parental and environmental factors may be equally important determinants of gender differences in aggression {Tieger, 1980:952-959; White, 1983:8-9~.
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From page 326... ...
Here, no gender differences emerged in levels of aggression among siblings, but differential reinforcement appeared for acts of aggression among boys and girls. Parents were particularly likely to punish boys when they fought with their sisters, and subsequent aggression was more frequent when boys were punished than when some other strategy was used.~4
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From page 327... ...
and those that involve an adult (arousing the need for approval! are more likely to demonstrate that boys are more aggressive than girls; in contrast, success or no-faiTure experiences and the absence of an adult are conducive to finding no gender differences in aggression.
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From page 328... ...
Gender Roles, Aggression, and Violence Among Adults By comparison to the studies of aggression in children, studies of gender differences in adult aggression reveal much smaller and less consistent findings {Frodi et al., 1977; Eagly and Steffen, 19861. The most robust findings suggest that {1)
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From page 329... ...
Finally, stemming from the hypothesized relationship between the women's movement and increases in female arrest rates, researchers have endeavored to determine whether trends toward gender equality have affected female involvement in crime. Perhaps stated most strongly by Adler i1975:3l, "The movement for full equality has a darker side which has been slighted even by the scientific community ....
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From page 330... ...
, have also been used to assess this hypothesis. Although the violent crime analyses are limited to homicides, there is no consistent evidence that the equalization of gender roles, which may accompany social and economic development, increases female crime {cf.
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From page 331... ...
. However, as we have seen, recent analyses of UCR data do show that decreases in some violent crimes are associated with increased female labor force participation.
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From page 332... ...
findings from an analysis ot the cycle ot violence hypothesis also speak to the question of gender roles and styles of pathology. Specifically, she found that although abused and neglected mates had substantially higher arrest rates for violent crimes than a matched group
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From page 333... ...
We have little evidence that objective indicators of changes in gender roles {such as the female percentage of the labor force) correlate with changes in levels of interpersonal violence, and we have no evidence that gender role identity or gender role attitudes are associated with violent crime for females.
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From page 334... ...
The former concerns the degree to which theories ot men s crime apply to women, and the latter focuses on what explains gender differences in rates and types of criminal activity. Work on the gender ratio problem, they believe, is dominated by mate scholars who rely on statistical evidence and elements of existing theory to develop new theoretical formulations that, in reality, are only variations of old theories of mate criminality ;e.g, social control and conflict theory as recently applied to the issue of gender and delinquency by HaOan et al., 1987.
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From page 335... ...
None of these scholars have formulated their own theory to explain the role of gender in crime or in violent crime; nevertheless, their work is significant in pointing out how the reliance on one type of methodology or style of work can limit our understanding of whether, and how, the processes that lead to violence differ for men and women and, within gender, for whites and nonwhites {Simpson, 19891. CORRELATES OF INTERPERSONAL VIOLENCE Research on the demographic and social correlates of violent crime suggests considerable gender variation.
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From page 336... ...
Certainly more exploration is needed about the patterns and correlates of female violence. Further analyses might address some of the following omissions in our knowledge of violent female offenders: L)
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From page 337... ...
female participation in crimes of violence is significantly Tower than that of mates; j2) race may represent an important variation in the gender-violent crime paradigm since black females have higher rates of homicide, and possibly other violent crimes, than white males; and {3)
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From page 338... ...
Again, gender role socialization may be a necessary, but not sufficient, explanatory variable for both the absolute gender gap in crime and the greater concentration of females in selected, "gender-appropriate" offense categories. However, to explain the relative narrowing of the gender gap in larceny, fraud, and forgery {and perhaps robbery)
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From page 339... ...
POLICY Research on patterns and trends in violent offending by femaTes has generally proceeded as if it had no relevance to sanclions and sentencing. Deterrence research, for example, virtually ignores potential gender variations in analyzing both the deter
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From page 340... ...
In this section we are particularly concerned with the ways in which the processing of women through the criminal justice system could either aggravate or mitigate their subsequent involvement in acts of interpersonal violence.is We review what little literature there is on sanctioning of both mate and female violent offenders; what, if any, conclusions can be drawn; and what questions remain. We then suggest additional areas of inquiry that could affect criminal justice policy pertaining to interpersonal violence.
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From page 341... ...
Adult Criminal Court Decisions As with juveniles, few analyses of the effects of gender on adult criminal justice processing decisions focus on violent crime. Accordingly, the following review relies heavily on studies including felony offenses and either controlling for or analyzing offense severity in interaction with the defendant's gender.
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From page 342... ...
the outcome of prior deviance processing decisions, produce leniency toward femaTes ;Kruttschnitt and Green, 1984; Zatz and Hagan, 1985; Miethe, 19871? The other explanation pertains to the gender role attitudes and stereotypes of the judiciary, as encompassed by the chivalry and paternalism theses See Nage!
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From page 343... ...
and the other in Great Britain iMandarkaSheppard, 19861. Nevertheless, the significant gender variations that emerge from them suggest that this area of research may improve our understanding of the processes that affect rates and trends of interpersonal violence by men and women.
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From page 344... ...
We began by asking whether violent female offenders are treated differently from their male counterparts in the criminal justice system and, if so, whether this affects their probability of engaging in subsequent violence. The extant research offers no definitive answer to this question.
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From page 345... ...
Because of the virtual dominance of male offenders, rape is not a useful offense for studying gender variations in violent offending, victimization, and adjudication. However, when we turn to the questions of whether and how the criminal justice system's treatment of violent crime victims impacts subsequent violence, rape and more recently domestic violence isee Pagan and Browne, in this volume)
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From page 346... ...
This latter finding was attributed to the increased likelihood that incidents involving younger suspects included characteristics that usually make the case less serious to the detectives {e.g., "date rapes"; LaFree, 1989:791. As in the reporting of sexual assaults, these data indicate that _.
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From page 347... ...
Feminist concerns about the selectivity with which rape cases are handled by the criminal justice system and the treatment accorded victims seem to be at least partially justified icf. Myers and LaFree, 19821.
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From page 348... ...
She found that sexual assault cases were more likely to be authorized for prosecution than nonsexual assault cases, but it is unclear whether this is an artifact of offense severity. The nonsexual assault cases included simple as well as aggravated assaults and case characteristics were not controlled.
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From page 349... ...
The objective of treating criminal sexual assaults like nonsexual assaults did not then appear to have been fully realized in Michigan. Indiana's attempts to improve rape conviction rates and lessen the importance of victim characteristics also seem somewhat unsuccessful.
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From page 350... ...
We need to determine whether the victim's race has a similar effect in other jurisdictions and in other violent crimes; recall that at least one empirical analysis of police responses to assaults revealed that the probability of arrest was least likely when the assault involved nonwhites. Admittedly, our knowledge of the criminal court processing of sexual assault cases is limited to specific jurisdictions and time periods.
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From page 351... ...
As such, the plan for future research begins by suggesting that if we want to advance our understanding of the relationship between gender and crime we cannot exclude violent offending. We will not significantly change our knowledge about the etiology and careers of violent female offenders by continuing to study violent mate offenders with the excuse that the smaller sample sizes of seriously violent females make firm conclusions more difficult.
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From page 352... ...
see Visher and Roth ~^~^~~ ' -' te.g., see vainer and Bran, 1Ybb:2511 and to notn participation rates and frequency of offending. These data may lead to a more informed approach to biological and sociological explanations for gender and interpersonal violence.
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From page 353... ...
. ~ Although tnese data pertain to only two types of violent crimesassault and rape they suggest that we need to examine more carefully whether victim attributes influence responses to all types of interpersonal violence.
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From page 354... ...
We hope that this paper will assist in that endeavor, as much perhaps by the acknowledgment of what remains to be uncovered by future research as by what the current data reveal. NOTES 1 Because an excellent assessment of strictly biological contributions to female crime, including violence, was recently completed ;see Widom and Ames, 19881, this topic is largely excluded from this review.
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From page 355... ...
The key question is whether we should include suburban UCR data in our calculation of arrest rates by gender and residence. First, we calculated the rates by eliminating suburban UCR data and including only central cities and rural data; second, we recalculated the data, combining the UCR suburban data with the UCR rural data to obtain the urban/ rural distinction used.
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From page 356... ...
The evidence on the changing role of women in terrorism is scant and mixed. Some authors argue that the involvement of women in terrorist activities will continue and intensify, moving away from support functions to full-scale terrorist operations {Corrado, 1980; Mann, 1984~; others suggest that data from both 1974 and 1980 indicate that there are still significant gender differences in the reasons for becoming involved in terrorist activities and the roles men and women play Weinberg and Eubank, 1987 ~ .
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From page 357... ...
15 Unfortunately, space limitations preclude examining the equally important issue of the ways in which noncriminal justice system agencies affect violence by and against women. Relevant reviews of this literature E.g., the role of counseling centers and crisis intervention)
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From page 358... ...
Hser, and W McGlothin 1987 Sex differences in addict careers.
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From page 359... ...
1. Panel on Research on Criminal Careers, Committee on Research on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice, National Research Council.
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From page 360... ...
Caplan, P.~. 1975 Sex differences in antisocial behavior: Does research methodology produce or abolish them?
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From page 361... ...
Issues in Criminology 8;FallJ:51-70. 1974 Juvenile delinquency: The sexualization of female crime.
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From page 362... ...
Morse 1986 Self-reported violent offending: A descriptive analysis of juvenile violent offenders and their offending careers. Journal of Interpersonal Violence 1 :472-514.
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From page 363... ...
Social Psychology Quarterly 51~11:11-18. Figueira-McDonough, T 1985 Gender differences in informal processing: A look at charge
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From page 364... ...
Johnson, and S Williams 1987 Measuring gender differences: The expressive dimension and critique of androgyny scales.
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From page 365... ...
Finley, and D.L. Glaser 1984 Labor force participation, sex-role attitudes and female crime.
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From page 366... ...
Horwitz, A.V., and H.R. White 1987 Gender role orientations and styles of pathology among adolescents.
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From page 367... ...
Johnson 1984 Sentencing recommendations and women offenders: The biopsychological model and the treatment of female offenders. Law and Inequality 2jll:97-120.
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From page 368... ...
Lewis, D.K. 1981 Black women offenders and criminal justice: Some theoretical considerations.
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From page 369... ...
Family Relations: journal of Applied Family and Child Studies 32~1~:101-109. 1986 Gender differences in courtship violence victimization.
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From page 370... ...
Shover 1978 Gender roles and female criminality. Criminology 15:87-104.
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From page 371... ...
Departments of Criminal Justice and Psychology, Indiana University. Robins, L.N.
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From page 372... ...
Smith, D.A. 1987a Police response to interpersonal violence: Defining the parameters of legal control.
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From page 373... ...
Solkoloff, eds., The Criminal Justice System and Women. New York: Clark Boardman Co.
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From page 374... ...
Roth, and C.A. Visher, eds., Criminal Careers and "Career Criminals", Vol.
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From page 375... ...
Weiner, N.A. 1989 Violent criminal careers and "violent career criminals." Pp.
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From page 376... ...
Montclair, N.~.: Patterson 1979 Victims of female offenders.
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