BORDERLINE PERSONALITY TRAITS AND INTIMATE PARTNER AGGRESSION AN INTERNATIONAL MULTISITE, CROSS-GENDER ANALYSIS.pdf

Psychology of Women Quarterly, 32 (2008), 290–302. Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Printed in the USA.

2008 Division 35, American Psychological Association. 0361-6843/08

BORDERLINE PERSONALITY TRAITS AND INTIMATE

PARTNER AGGRESSION: AN INTERNATIONAL MULTISITE,

CROSS-GENDER ANALYSIS

Denise A. Hines

ClarkUniversity

Although research has consistently shown that men and women use intimate partner aggression (IPA) at approximately

equal rates, there is little empirical research on whether the predictors of IPA are the same for men and women. The

current study investigated whether borderline personality (BP) differentially predicted the use of IPA for men and

women across 67 university sites from around the world. Results showed that BP predicted several forms of IPA and

that gender did not moderate the association between IPA and BP. Although the strength of the association between

IPA and BP significantly differed across sites, it was in the predicted direction for the overwhelming majority of sites.

Implications of these results and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Intimate partner aggression (IPA) is typically considered to

consist of physical, emotional, and/or sexual aggression—

any one of these in and of themselves can constitute IPA,

as can any combination of two or all three. Since the ad-

vent of research into IPA in the early 1970s, there has been

evidence that both women and men use physical and psy-

chological IPA at rates that are approximately equal (e.g.,

Gelles, 1974), whereas women’s use of sexual IPA is typi-

cally less thanmen’s (e.g., Cantos, Neidig, &O’Leary, 1994;

Hines & Saudino, 2003; Swan & Snow, 2002). Moreover,

several studies have shown that women and men initiate

physical IPA at equal rates and that, in 25% of violent re-

lationships, only the women had been physically aggressive

within the previous year. In 25% of violent relationships,

only the man had been physically aggressive within the pre-

vious year, and in 50% of violent relationships, both part-

ners were physically aggressive (Carrado, George, Loxam,

Jones, & Templar, 1996; Demaris, 1992; Hines & Saudino,

2003; Morse, 1995; Stets & Straus, 1990). The equivalent

rates of physical IPA by men and women has recently been

confirmed by a meta-analysis of dozens of studies of IPA

over a 30-year period (Archer, 2000) and is further con-

firmed by the dramatic rise in women’s arrests and pros-

ecution for domestic violence in states across the nation

since the inception of mandatory arrest policies (Buzawa

& Buzawa, 2002). Although there is an abundance of re-

search showing that men and women use approximately

equal rates of physical IPA, there is considerably less re-

search on whether the prediction of IPA is equivalent for

men and women.

IPAandBorderlinePersonality

Few researchers have investigated whether there are gen-

der differences in the extent to which personality dysfunc-

tion predicts various forms of IPA, even though there is a

growing body of research showing that criminal behavior

and physical IPA perpetration are manifestations of per-

sonality traits (e.g., Krueger, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2000) and

dysfunction (e.g., Holtzworth-Munroe, Meehan, Herron,

Rehman, & Stuart, 2000) in men. One personality dysfunc-

tion that is related to the use of IPA in men, and may be for

women, is borderline personality (BP). The termBP will be

used here to refer to traits of Borderline Personality Disor-

der (BPD) that do not necessarily meet diagnostic criteria.

BP is somewhat synonymous with what Dutton (1995) calls

“borderline personality organization,” which is a less severe

form of BPD and is exhibited by 11–15% of the population

(in comparison to 1.5–4%who exhibit BPD). Because BPD

is three times more common among women than among

men (American Psychiatric Association, 1994), it is likely

that BP is also more common among women, and it is,

Denise A. Hines, Department of Psychology, Clark University.

This work was supported by the National Institute of Mental

Health grant T32MH15161 and by the University of New Hamp-

shire. This article is part of the International Dating Violence

Study. Other papers from that study can be downloaded from

http://pubpages.unh.edu/

∼

290

mas2.

Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Denise A.

Hines, Clark University, Department of Psychology, 950 Main

St., Worcester, MA 01610. E-mail: dhines@clarku.edu

BorderlinePersonalityandAggression

291

therefore, a good candidate for being associated with IPA

in women.

According to Dutton (1995), the essential characteris-

tics of BP organization, from most important to least, are

“proclivity for intense, unstable interpersonal relationships

characterized by intermittent undermining of the signifi-

cant other, manipulation, and masked dependency; an un-

stable sense of self with intolerance of being alone and

abandonment anxiety; and intense anger, demandingness,

and impulsivity, usually tied to substance abuse or promis-

cuity” (p. 570). People with BP organization experience re-

lationships in which their emotional needs go unmet, and

they do not have the skills to assert their needs in a healthy

way. Frustrations can increase when they do not get what

they want or need in their intimate relationship. When they

perceive a possible loss of the relationship, people with BP

organization, who have an intense fear of abandonment and

loneliness, may experience intense anger or rage. Because

people with BP organization do not have the requisite skills

to appropriately handle their anger, they are at a high likeli-

hood of physically lashing out. In addition, because people

with BP organization see their significant other as either all

good or all bad, at this stage they tend to devalue their part-

ners, further increasing the likelihood of IPA. In an effort

to keep their partners from abandoning them, they may

engage in further manipulative and controlling behaviors

to keep them from leaving the relationship. Thus, people

with BP organization tend to have very intense, unstable

relationships and identities (Dutton, 1995).

Studies of men in batterer treatment programs support

the notion that BP traits are a strong predictor of their use

of physical IPA (e.g., Dutton, 1995; Dutton & Browning,

1988; Dutton, Starzomski, & Ryan, 1996; Hart, Dutton, &

Newlove, 1993; Hastings &Hamberger, 1988; Holtzworth-

Munroe, Bates, Smutzler, & Sandin, 1997; Mauricio, Tein,

& Lopez, 2007; Oldham et al., 1985) and psychological

IPA (Dutton & Starzomski, 1993; Mauricio et al., 2007;

Oldham et al., 1985). Their use of IPA is usually impul-

sive and a function of their mood rather than any external

stimulus. Men suffering from BP organization tend to be

emotionally volatile. They are angry, jealous, and depressed

men, who tend to use IPA when there is some sort of per-

ceived “socioemotional distance” between them and their

female partners (Dutton, 1995).

Themajority of this research has been conducted on clin-

ical samples of male batterers, and we do not know whether

these findings would generalize to women. However, pre-

liminary evidence suggests that some women who use IPA

might be suffering from BP. For example, Margolies and

Leeder (1995) provided a clinical description of lesbian

batterers in their intervention program. This description

mirrored symptoms of BP. The women in this study “ex-

hibited a striking propensity for dichotomous thinking and

feeling. They were prone to extreme views and hyperbole,

dividing the world into black and white” (p. 144). They

were overly dependent on their partners for both attention

and emotional support, and they often tried to emotionally

merge with their partners. They used violence when they

felt that their partners were becoming emotionally distant

or when there was a threatened physical separation. They

viewed these actions as abandonment, and they evidenced

a chronic fear of abandonment. Thus, violence was used to

maintain a connection to their partners.

Stuart, Moore, Gordon, Ramsey, and Kahler (2006), in

a comparison of women arrested for IPA and mandated

into treatment with women from the general population,

found that the odds of women arrested for IPA having BPD

were 20.3 times greater than women in the general popu-

lation. Comparison studies of men and women mandated

into treatment for IPA also show evidence that women who

perpetrate IPA evidence BP, perhaps even at rates that are

higher than those of men. For example, the female batter-

ers in Henning, Jones, and Holdford’s (2003) study were

significantly more likely to evidence BP patterns than the

male batterers (11.6% versus 2.8%).

Although there is evidence among clinical samples that

women with BP might be at greater risk of using IPA,

it is unknown whether these results would generalize to

nonclinical samples. The associations between BP and IPA

in nonclinical samples are important to consider because

most IPA never comes to the attention of authorities, yet

is still detrimental to the mental and physical health of

its victims (Straus & Gelles, 1990). In addition, although

BP predicts both physical and psychological IPA by men

and physical IPA by women, it is unknown whether these

associations would generalize to sexual IPA by both genders

or psychological IPA by women.

Moreover, IPA affects men and women in every region

of the world (World Health Organization, 2005; Straus &

the International Dating Violence Research Consortium,

2004), and studies show that BPD is evident all over the

world and is one of the most common types of personal-

ity disorders worldwide (Loranger et al., 1994). However,

there is little research demonstrating a link between BP

and IPA in non-Western cultures and countries other than

the United States. This possible link in other cultures and

countries is important to investigate because it could point

toward either similar or different prevention and interven-

tion techniques in other cultures. Moreover, if there is a

difference among cultures in the association between BP

and IPA, possible reasons for these differences should be

explored. For example, it is possible that the association

between BP and IPA is stronger in cultures in which IPA is

not culturally accepted, but weaker in cultures where IPA

is more common and acceptable.

The purpose of the current study was to evaluate:

(1) Whether BP is a significant predictor of physi-

cal, psychological, and sexual IPA among men and

women in a nonclinical population. Given the pre-

vious research establishing a positive association be-

tween physical and psychological IPA and BP among

292

H INES

men and women in clinical samples (e.g., Dutton &

Starzomski, 1993; Stuart et al., 2006), it is expected

that this association will also generalize to nonclinical

samples.

(2) Whether there are gender differences in the pre-

diction of physical, psychological, and sexual IPA

from BP. Previous research among male and fe-

male batterers who were arrested for IPA (Hen-

ning et al., 2003) suggests that BP may be more

common among female batterers than male bat-

terers. However, other empirical research of men

and women in community, nationally representa-

tive, clinical, and birth cohort samples (e.g., Busch

& Rosenberg, 2004; Capaldi & Owen, 2001; Carney

& Buttell, 2004; Giordano, Millhollin, Cernkovich,

Pugh, & Rudolph, 1999; Henning et al., 2003; Mag-

dol,Moffitt, Caspi, &Silva, 1998;Medeiros &Straus,

2006) suggests that there is gender symmetry in the

variables that predict IPA, including various person-

ality traits and dysfunctions. Therefore, it is hypoth-

esized that the association between BP and IPA will

be similar for men and women.

(3) Whether these associations hold constant across 67

sites from around the world. Because there has been

little to no cross-cultural research on the associa-

tion between BP and IPA, no specific hypotheses

were made concerning whether these associations

would be consistent across sites. However, if differ-

ences are found, reasons for such differences were

planned.

relationships and that it would include sensitive questions

concerning attitudes, beliefs, and experiences in a relation-

ship, including questions on sexual behavior. They were

guaranteed anonymity, and they were told that the session

would take about an hour. Students completed the ques-

tionnaire at their own pace and deposited the completed

(or if they chose, blank) questionnaire in a box and left the

room when they finished. A debriefing form was provided

as they turned in their questionnaire. It explained the study

in more detail and provided names and telephone numbers

of local mental health services and community resources,

such as services for battered women.

The percentage of students who chose to participate and

deposited a completed questionnaire ranged from 42% to

100%, with most participation rates ranging from 85% to

95%. A detailed description of the study, including the

questionnaires and all other key documents, is available on

the study website: http://pubpages.unh.edu/

∼

3,152) were eliminated from the analy-

ses. Because of questionable data from the Iranian sample

that could not adequately be explained, the Iranian site was

eliminated from the analysis ( n

METHOD

98). This procedure left a

sample of 14,154 students (4,054 men and 10,100 women).

A list of the sites involved is given in Table 5.

Demographic characteristics of the sample are shown in

Table 1. These characteristics are presented for the sample

overall and for each gender, and the sites that represented

the high and low scores for each variable are also presented.

As shown for the men, sample sizes ranged from 4 men at

the Calcutta, India site to 163 men at the Swedish site. The

mean length of relationship for the male sample was 12.70

months, close to 70% of the relationships were sexual, and

95.8% of the men were involved in heterosexual intimate

relationships. For women, the sample sizes ranged from

20 at the Calcutta, India site to 511 at the Swedish site.

Women reported an average relationship length of 15.08

months, sex was part of the relationship in 73.3% of the

cases, and 98% of the women were involved in heterosexual

relationships.

Participants

The data for this article were from the International Dat-

ing Violence Study (IDVS). The IDVS was conducted by

members of a consortium of researchers at universities in

various regions of the world. Consortium members volun-

teered to become part of the study after hearing about the

study at international family violence conferences, because

of previous collaborations with the principal investigator, or

through word of mouth. The questionnaires were usually

administered in classes taught by members of the consor-

tium and in other classes for which they could make ar-

rangements. Thus, it was a convenience sample. Almost all

of the classes were introductory-level psychology, sociology,

and criminal justice studies courses; thus, the majority of

the sample consisted of female college students. The data

presented in the current analysis are from 67 university

sites around the world.

Questionnaires were distributed at the beginning of the

class period. The purpose of the study and that participa-

tion was entirely voluntary was explained orally and was also

written on the cover page of the questionnaire. The students

were informed that the questionnaire was about dating

Measures

There was a core questionnaire that each member of

the IDVS Research Consortium translated. All consortium

members agreed to back-translate to maintain conceptual

mas2.

The completed questionnaires were examined for ques-

tionable response patterns, such as reporting an injury from

dating violence but not reporting an assault as having oc-

curred, or reporting an attack on a partner with a knife or

gun 10 or more times in the past year. About 7.5% of the

original 15,321 cases were identified as questionable and

were removed from the sample, leaving 14,252 students. In

addition, only students who were currently or recently (i.e.,

within the previous year) involved in a romantic relationship

were instructed to complete the measure of dating aggres-

sion; students who did not complete the measure of dating

aggression ( n

BorderlinePersonalityandAggression

293

Table 1

Demographics

Total

Men

Women

t or

14,154

4,054

10,100

High

674

163

511

(Gavle, Sweden)

Low

(Calcutta, India)

Individual Demographics

Age (M, SD)

23.12, 6.28

23.01, 5.56

23.16, 6.55

1.41

High

39.06, 9.71

38.09, 10.04

39.98, 9.14

(Liege, Belgium)

(German-speaking Switzerland)

(Liege, Belgium)

Low

18.65, 1.36

18.86, 1.60

18.45, 1.04

(St. Petersburg 2, Russia)

Social Desirability (M, SD)

2.62, 0.36

2.59, 0.35

2.63, 0.36

6.49 ∗∗∗

High

2.91, 0.42

2.88

2.94, 0.40

(Merida, Venezuela)

(Cluj-Napcoa, Romania,

(Merida, Venezuela)

0.39; Northern

Mexico, SD

0.35;

Merida, Venezuela,

0.46)

Low

2.39, 0.38

2.34, 0.38

2.39, 0.36

(Mito, Japan)

(Washington, DC, USA)

(Mito, Japan)

Borderline Personality (M, SD)

1.98, 0.49

2.00, 0.45

1.97, 0.50

3.96 ∗∗∗

High

2.42, 0.44

2.29, 0.44

2.48, 0.44

(Taiwan)

(Beijing, China)

(Taiwan)

Low

1.58, 0.41

1.52, 0.34

1.59, 0.42

(Leiden, Netherlands)

Relationship Demographics

Relationship Length

14.40, 8.92

12.70, 9.01

15.08, 8.80

14.31 ∗∗∗

in months (M, SD)

High

19.46, 7.27

19.13, 8.01

19.90, 7.01

(Gavle, Sweden)

(Leiden, Netherlands)

(Gavle, Sweden)

Low

6.21, 6.71

6.04, 5.80

6.38, 7.57

(St. Petersburg 2, Russia)

% Sex in Relationship

72.1%

69.2%

73.3%

24.30 ∗∗∗

High

97.8%

98.2%

99.0%

(Gavle, Sweden &

(Quebec 2, Canada)

(Freiburg, Germany)

Freiburg, Germany)

Low

11.8%

5.9%

14.5%

(Varsanyi, Hungary)

% Heterosexual Relationships

97.4%

95.8%

98.0%

55.47 ∗∗∗

High

99.6%

100%

(Cluj-Napcoa, Romania)

(10 sites)

(9 sites)

Low

92.7%

68.2%

92.4%

(Jackson, MS, USA)

(Washington, DC, USA)

Intimate Partner Aggression

% Any Physical Aggression

29.0%

23.9%

31.0%

70.14 ∗∗∗

High

49.6%

54.7%

54.8%

(New York, NY, USA)

(Vladivostok, Russia)

Low

15.4%

9.4%

11.6%

(Houston, TX, USA)

(Hamilton, Canada)

(Houston, TX, USA)

% Severe Physical Aggression

10.4%

8.0%

11.3%

34.95 ∗∗∗

High

24.4%

28.6%

25.0%

(New York, NY, USA)

(Capetown, South Africa)

(Crete 2, Greece)

Low

1.8%

2.0%

(Gavle, Sweden)

(Calcutta, India; Singapore;

(Amsterdam, Netherlands)

Hamilton, Canada; Malta)

(continued)

294

H INES

Table 1 (continued)

Total

Men

Women

t or

Types of Physical Aggression

0.69, 1.47

0.54, 1.29

0.76, 1.53

8.69 ∗∗∗

(M, SD)

High

1.57, 2.22

2.29, 3.95

1.65, 2.32

(New York, NY, USA)

(Capetown, South Africa)

(New York, NY, USA)

Low

0.33

0.13, 0.42

0.23, 0.78

(Portugal, SD

.98;

(Hamilton, Canada)

(Houston, TX, USA)

Malta, SD

.82)

% Any Psychological Aggression

72.6%

65.7%

75.3%

133.96 ∗∗∗

High

91.0%

100%

90.9%

(Washington, DC, USA)

(Calcultta, India)

(Washington, DC, USA)

Low

45.7%

36.7%

42.9%

(St. Petersburg 1, Russia)

(Shanghai)

(St. Petersburg 1, Russia)

% Severe Psychological

24.0%

20.9%

25.3%

30.47 ∗∗∗

Aggression

High

57.7%

50.8%

60.3%

(Hong Kong 3)

(Hong Kong 1)

(Hong Kong 3)

Low

8.3%

7.6%

(Gavle, Sweden)

(Winnipeg, Canada)

(Gavle, Sweden)

Types of Psychological

2.04, 1.82

1.72, 1.76

2.17, 1.82

13.55 ∗∗∗

Aggression (M, SD)

High

3.03, 1.98

2.92, 1.51

3.07, 1.98

(New York, NY, USA)

(Washington, DC, USA)

(New York, NY, USA)

Low

1.20, 1.60

0.88, 1.58

1.25, 1.72

(St. Petersburg 1, Russia)

(Shanghai, China)

(St. Petersburg 1, Russia)

% Any Sexual Aggression

23.5%

29.3%

21.2%

105.00 ∗∗∗

High

60.9%

65.3%

58.3%

(Merida, Venezuela)

Low

5.2%

4.6%

4.7%

(Leiden, Netherlands)

(Hong Kong 1)

(Leiden, Netherlands)

% Forced Sexual Aggression

1.7%

2.2%

1.5%

7.71 ∗∗

High

7.2%

14.3%

10.5%

(Louisiana, USA)

(Capetown, South Africa)

(Dar Salaam, Tanzania)

Low

(7 sites)

(25 sites)

(15 sites)

Types of Sexual Aggression

0.34, 0.73

0.47, 0.89

0.29, 0.64

12.18 ∗∗∗

(M, SD)

High

0.86, 0.98

1.11, 1.15

0.93, 1.26

(Merida, Venezuela)

(New York, NY, USA)

(Dar Salaam, Tanzania)

Low

0.06, 0.25

0.07, 0.26

0.05, 0.21

(Leiden, Netherlands)

(Hong Kong 3)

(Leiden, Netherlands)

Note. Gender differences between the demographic variables were explored using chi-square or t tests, where appropriate. The Social Desirability

and Borderline Personality scales ranged from 1 to 4. The maximum number of types of physical aggression was 12; the maximum number of types of

psychological aggression was 8, and the maximum number of types of sexual aggression was 7.

∗∗ p

.01. ∗∗∗ p

.001.

equivalence (Straus, 1969) across the sites. This core ques-

tionnaire consisted of demographic items (e.g., gender,

gender of partner, whether sex was part of the relation-

ship, age of participant, parents’ education and income,

length of relationship), the Revised Conflict Tactics Scales

(CTS2; Straus, Hamby, Boney-McCoy, &Sugarman, 1996),

and the Personal and Relationships Profile (PRP; Straus,

Hamby, Boney-McCoy, & Sugarman, 1999). In addition,

the consortium members added questions to measure vari-

ables that were uniquely important for their site or con-

structs that were needed to test a theory of particular in-

terest. For the current study, only the demographic infor-

mation and questions pertaining to the use of IPA, BP, and

social desirability were used.

IPA. The use of IPA was measured by the physical ag-

gression, psychological aggression, and sexual aggression

scales of the CTS2. For each participant, the number of

different types of physically aggressive, psychologically ag-

gressive, and sexually aggressive acts used in the previous

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