NCJ Number
215878
Journal
Journal of Family Violence Volume: 21 Issue: 1 Dated: January 2006 Pages: 1-9
Date Published
January 2006
Length
9 pages
Annotation
This article reports on an experiment that compared two question orders--that of the original Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS1) and the revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2)--so as to determine which of the two question orders resulted in higher disclosure rates for physical and sexual assault of a dating partner.
Abstract
Findings show that the CTS2 random order of questions produced significantly higher disclosure rates for the scales that measure criminal behavior (Physical Assault, Injury, and Sexual Coercion) and made no difference for the other CTS2 scales (Negotiation and Psychological Aggression). The greater disclosure of criminal and antisocial behavior was consistent for disclosure by both victims and perpetrators, for men and women, for younger and older respondents, and regardless of scores on a socioeconomic status scale, as well as scores on a social desirability response set scale. Although these findings suggest that the CTS2 random order of questions is to be preferred to the CTS1's use of the sequence approach, the authors explain why the methodology of this research requires viewing the results with caution. The standard version of the CTS2, which intersperses questions from each of the 5 scales in a slightly modified random order, was administered to every second student in a sample of 417 university students. The other half of the sample were given the same instrument, but with the questions in the culturally recognized sequential order used in the CTS1. The cultural sequence order begins with the socially approved behaviors in the negotiation scale and ends with scales that measure antisocial and criminal behavior, such as the Physical Assault scale. 4 tables and 16 references