Examining an extension of Johnson's hypothesis: Is Male perpetrated intimate partner violence more underreported than Female violence?

Abstract

This paper examines two hypotheses about under-reporting in intimate partner violence data. The first hypothesis holds that significant amounts of under-reporting of intimate partner violence occur due to stigma. The second examines the empirical evidence behind Johnson's (Journal of Marriage and the Family 57:238-294, 1995) contention that controversial findings of equal rates of intimate partner violence perpetration among men and women occur through a combination of heterogeneity in type of intimate partner violence and missing data. E. M. and Data Augmentation are used to correct for item non-response in the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods. Strong support is found for general under-reporting; weak support is found for greater under-reporting of male violence. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.