{"id":931,"date":"2004-06-26T12:54:18","date_gmt":"2004-06-26T20:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2004\/06\/26\/more-on-evangelicals-and-intimate-violence\/"},"modified":"2004-06-26T12:54:18","modified_gmt":"2004-06-26T20:54:18","slug":"more-on-evangelicals-and-intimate-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=931","title":{"rendered":"More on Evangelicals and Intimate Violence"},"content":{"rendered":"

There have been three relevant posts on Family Scholars Blog <\/a>since my semi-critique of Brad Wilcox’s research<\/a>. (I say “semi-critique” because I haven’t actually read Dr. Wilcox’s book, so I’ve been relying mainly on the press release and press reports). First, a comment by Tom Sylvester<\/a>, directly responding to my post. Second, a link to an interesting interview with Dr. Wilcox<\/a>. Finally, a comment from Dr. Wilcox himself<\/a> (dammit, why I don’t I <\/i>ever get comments from well-known scholars?).<\/p>\n

I’m combining most of my responses to those three posts into a single post. (For those “Alas” readers who aren’t so interested in social science issues, save this post for later reading when you need a sleep-aid.)<\/p>\n

Tom Sylvester writes<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Barry Deutsch questions Brad Wilcox’s finding that evangelical Christian husbands are among the least violent men out there. His critique argues that the National Survey of Families and Households, from which Wilcox draws his data, is not very good at measuring domestic violence. I don’t know enough about the NSFH to have an informed opinion, but it seems to me that even with problems of underreporting, the problem would be consistent across the whole survey pool. Therefore, even if the NSFH isn’t an accurate measure of domestic violence, the survey could still be used to compare relative rates of violence among different demographic groups. Of course, there is still the possibility that evangelical wives would be less likely to report such abuse.<\/div>\n

I can see Tom’s point, and to a certain extent I agree. Since perfect data is never available, it makes pragmatic sense to tease out the best conclusions we can from the best imperfect data available.<\/p>\n

However, in this case, there is much better data <\/a>on intimate violence available. Before leaping to conclusions, I’d suggest advocating for a new study combining good methodology for measuring intimate violence with questions about religion.<\/p>\n

Regarding underreporting, Dr. Wilcox writes <\/a>that “I’m not convinced that abusive evangelical husbands would have been more manipulative than abusive non-evangelical husbands.” I’m not convinced of it either, but I think the possibility that evangelical wives may be more likely to underreport must be seriously considered. I see several possible reasons evangelicals may be less likely to report abuse:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Evangelical wives may be more ashamed of having a dysfunctional or imperfect marriage than other wives (given the evangelical emphasis on marriage as a sign of moral worth and failed marriages as moral failures, such a difference would not be surprising). If such a bias exists, it would be consistent with Dr. Wilcox’s finding that evangelical wives report a higher level of satisfaction with their marriage, since evangelical culture would also encourage reporting high satisfaction within marriage.\n
  2. Abused evangelical wives may be more closely supervised by their husbands than non-evangelical wives, leaving them less free to answer a survey honestly (this would be consistent with evangelical “husband’s headship of the family” ideology).\n
  3. Evangelicals may be more suspicious of academic research than other groups (due to frequent evangelical criticism of academic research as left-wing-biased and anti-family), making them less likely to report sensitive subjects like abuse.\n
  4. Evangelical wives who are abused and therefore get divorced may be more likely to leave the evangelical community, due to negative attitidues towards divorcees in the evangelical community; and having left the community, won’t be included in samples of evangelicals.<\/ol>\n

    Of course, I don’t know any of this for certain – but neither does Dr. Wilcox. Especially when using a survey instrument that will lead to underreporting, that evangelicals in particular could have stronger reasons to underreport is an important concern.<\/p>\n

    Furthermore, even if it is true that evangelical husbands who attend church every week are less likely to hit their wives, that still leaves the question of causation wide open. As I pointed out in my earlier post, Dr. Wilcox’s findings may simply reflect the fact that heavy drinkers are both less likely to attend church regularly (especially evangelical church) and more likely to beat their wives. (Dr. Wilcox’s study did attempt to control for alcohol abuse, but – from what I can tell, which may be mistaken, since I haven’t read his book – did so with an extremely dubious measure. See my previous post <\/a>for a more detailed discussion of this issue.)<\/p>\n

    Another possibility, pointed out by Trish Wilson <\/a>in comments<\/a>, is that a lower rate of intimate violence may be caused by the wife’s frequent church attendance.<\/p>\n

    The reason there are higher rates of domestic violence in those situations is that it’s likely that the abused wife is also not active in the congregation. Abusers control their victims social contacts and encourage isolation so that they may have better control over their victims. If she had better contact with the congregation, she’d be around more people, and she’d be in a better position to get help.<\/div>\n

    Supporting Trish’s theory, a study several years ago (I don’t have the reference offhand, but I can locate it if anyone needs me to) found that evangelical husbands who attend church every week were less likely to hit their wives than most men – except when their wives didn’t attend weekly<\/i>. Trish’s interpretation accounts for that finding, but I don’t see how Dr. Wilcox’s interpretation could. (Of course, I haven’t read Dr. Wilcox’s book, so it’s possible he accounts for it fully, or refutes it statistically).<\/p>\n

    Trish’s theory is also supported by Dr. Wilcox’s finding that “the nominal evangelicals who don’t attend services with any regularity have the highest rates of domestic violence.”<\/p>\n

    And, of course, it’s also possible that Dr. Wilcox is completely right. Evangelicals who attend church every week are less likely to hit their wives, and the reason is that “active evangelical family men get lots of formal and informal messages about the family responsibilities that go with their ‘headship’; they are also encouraged to focus on the emotional sides of their marriages.”<\/p>\n

    My point is simply that – as far as I can tell, not having yet read Dr. Wilcox’s book – nothing in Dr. Wilcox’s research enables us to distinguish between these interpretations of his results. It’s possible that Dr. Wilcox’s findings on weekly evangelical church attendance and intimate violence are absolutely correct; but it’s also possible that they simply reflect some other cause, such as alcohol abuse or the protective effect of wives attending church regularly; or perhaps they simply reflect measurement error. Although Dr. Wilcox clearly prefers the “attending church regularly makes men less abusive” interpretation, that interpretation is no better supported by the data than the alternatives I’ve suggested.<\/p>\n

    (It’s also likely, by the way, that Dr. Wilcox is only measuring the relatively minor instances of intimate violence, in which case his research cannot be generalized into conclusions about the most severe cases. But to get into that would require a great deal more discussion of survey methodology than I think my readers have patience for. See my previous post on “battered husbands”<\/a> for more discussion of methodology.)<\/p>\n

    * * *<\/p>\n

    It’s interesting (and agreeable to me, but that’s predictable!) that Dr. Wilcox gives some credit to feminism for improving the attitude of evangelical men: “I think it’s important to note that I think one of the reasons they do such a good job nowadays is that they take to heart the feminist concern that historically men have not done such a good job paying attention to the needs of their wives and children.”<\/p>\n

    * * *<\/p>\n

    In the interview, Dr. Wilcox says:<\/p>\n

    My hope is that the study might contribute in some way to a cease-fire in the culture wars we have … between feminists and religious conservatives. I think we need to recognize that the reality on the ground is that fathers who are religious conservatives are actually, in many ways, quite progressive in their approach to family life.<\/div>\n

    I think that’s quite likely true. Although I’m not evangelical, I’ve had many conservative evangelical friends (virtually all of whom attended church weekly), and my job at a church site brings me into regular contact with evangelical conservative church-goers. From my experience, the great majority of evangelical men are not patriarchal monsters, any more than the great majority of feminists are man-haters. On the contrary, I’ve met many evangelical men who struck me as exceptionally gentle and thoughtful.<\/p>\n

    However, I think the best we can hope for between feminists and evangelicals is some mutual respect; hoping for an end to the “culture war” is asking too much. There are many issues (abortion and homosexuality are just the two most obvious ones) in which even mutually respectful feminists and evangelicals will never be able to agree.<\/p>\n

    Furthermore, when looking at a particular culture (or sub-culture), the question isn’t just “how many men beat their wives.” From what I can tell, the large majority of men aren’t violent monsters, no matter what sub-culture or religious group one looks at. When it comes to looking at communities – at least for this feminist – we need to ask further questions. Questions like, “how easy does this community make it for a woman to say ‘he hit me and therefore I need a divorce’? Are such things considered shameful secrets that the victim should keep to herself? How quick will a community be to reject and scorn a man who does beat his wife? ”<\/p>\n

    Of course, I’m not saying that Dr. Wilcox’s research should or could have covered these questions; no study can cover everything. But when we discuss the general topic of domestic violence and the attititudes of the evangelical community – or any community – questions like that are on the feminist agenda..<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    There have been three relevant posts on Family Scholars Blog since my semi-critique of Brad Wilcox’s research. (I say “semi-critique” because I haven’t actually read Dr. Wilcox’s book, so I’ve been relying mainly on the press release and press reports). … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[96],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rape-intimate-violence-related-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}