Domestic abuse, crime surveys and the fallacy of risk: Exploring partner and domestic abuse using the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey
| Author | Sarah MacQueen |
| Published date | 01 September 2016 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1748895816634410 |
| Date | 01 September 2016 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Criminology & Criminal Justice
2016, Vol. 16(4) 470 –496
© The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/1748895816634410
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Domestic abuse, crime
surveys and the fallacy of risk:
Exploring partner and domestic
abuse using the Scottish Crime
and Justice Survey
Sarah MacQueen
University of Edinburgh, UK
Abstract
The Scottish Crime and Justice Survey (SCJS) consistently suggests similar prevalence of domestic
abuse among men and women, a finding used variously to indicate men and women’s equal risk of
abuse and to dismiss the survey as a means to explore such experiences. However, assertions of
equal risk are based on limited analyses of data reduced to ‘key’ figures for public dissemination,
and subsequent criticisms fail to meaningfully engage with the broader data offered by the survey.
Theoretically informed multivariate analyses demonstrate that risk of abuse is inadequately
captured by such figures, supporting that women and men are not at equal risk, and that gender
is but one of a number of influential risk factors. This article proposes the SCJS data could be put
to greater use, offering rich information for developing theory and responses to violence, and
that critical engagement with the survey is necessary to facilitate methodological improvement.
Keywords
Crime and victimization surveys, domestic abuse
Introduction
Following growing pressure to address domestic abuse, survey methods have increas-
ingly been adopted to estimate the prevalence or risk of abuse across national popula-
tions. Since 2008, Scotland, like England and Wales, has utilized its national victimization
survey to explore experiences of abuse perpetrated by partners, despite historical criti-
cisms regarding the use of such methods to capture prevalence. Early US attempts to
Corresponding author:
Sarah MacQueen, University of Edinburgh, Law School, 15 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh, EH8 9LN, UK.
Email: Sarah.MacQueen@ed.ac.uk
634410CRJ0010.1177/1748895816634410Criminology & Criminal JusticeMacQueen
research-article2016
Article
MacQueen 471
establish prevalence relied on the much maligned Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS; Straus,
1979), wherein individuals would identify how many times they had used acts of physi-
cal violence, with responses scaled to determine violence extent and severity. Findings
suggested a controversial ‘sexual symmetry’ of violence (Dobash et al., 1992) with
women emerging as equally or more likely than men to use violence in relationships
(Hines and Douglas, 2009; Straus, 1979; Tjaden and Thoennes, 2000). The idea that men
could be as at risk as women runs contra to dominant feminist expositions of domestic
abuse as an issue of men’s violence against women. Attempts to address this sexual sym-
metry focus on critiquing the measures used to gather data on the basis that meaning and
context render men and women’s violence fundamentally different. Support is typically
drawn from data gathered via different methodologies, demonstrating that very different
behaviours can be conflated through reliance on narrowly conceptualized ‘act-based’
measures of violence and lack of attention to victim perspectives (Dobash and Dobash,
2004; Dobash et al., 1992; Johnson, 1995, 2001; Johnson and Leone, 2005). Further
issues are raised around definition, measurement and methods of administration in sur-
veys. ‘Fit’ between victims’ perception and definition of their experience (and of them-
selves and their abuser) and question wording influence responses (Thoresen and
Øverlien, 2009), as might locating questions on the behaviour of partners or ex-partners
within particular forms of survey (Johnson, 1995; Walby and Myhill, 2001). The effects
of survey mode are also made clear, with the privacy of self-completion methods shown
to encourage substantially greater rates of abuse reporting (Walby, 2005), and possible
absences of the most severely and recently abused from typical sampling frames are
highlighted (Walby and Myhill, 2001).
The self-completion SCJS partner abuse module has been developed broadly in line
with the literature on appropriate methodologies, although key limitations remain.
Presently, a series of questions ask respondents about different forms of physical and
psychological abuse they have experienced since the age of 16, and query whether the
abuse reported occurred within the 12 months preceding the survey interview (the ‘refer-
ence period’). As per other population surveys, questions are presented to men and
women. While the development of abuse indicators has inevitably drawn from the CTS
example, a far wider range of behaviours are included and, moreover, the survey is not
concerned with counting and scaling specific incidents, but rather in capturing broad
experience, focusing on victimization not perpetration. Nevertheless, headline findings
have led to controversy due to consistent similarity of prevalence among men and women
(around 3 per cent each) within the survey reference period (MacLeod and Page, 2010;
MacLeod et al., 2009; MacQueen, 2014; Scottish Government, 2011). The reduction of
the data into ‘key figures’ for public presentation, and the disproportionate attention that
this single figure has received, has led to dismissal of the SCJS in line with criticisms
levelled at historical attempts to gather information on abuse using questionnaire-based
survey methods. Specifically, McFeely et al. (2013:2) critique the survey as adding to
gender symmetry myths, falsely espousing men and women experience equal risk of
victimization, due to its incident focus, simplistic counting of discrete acts of physical
violence and ‘narrow, short-term approach’ to violence.
This is a flawed criticism, however, arising through lack of engagement with the
SCJS, its measures, methods and resultant data. It is not appropriate to dismiss the survey
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