Child‐to‐Parent Violence: Examining the Frequency and Reasons in Spanish Youth

• Published date: 01 October 2021
• Author: M. Carmen Cano‐Lozano,Samuel P. León,Lourdes Contreras
• Date: 01 October 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12567

M. C C-L , S P. L ,  L C Universidad

de Jaén

Child-to-Parent Violence: Examining the Frequency

and Reasons in Spanish Youth

Objective: The structure,reliability, and validity

of the Child-to-Parent Violence Questionnaire

(CPV-Q) for youth is analyzed. Additionally, the

frequency of child-to-parent violence and the

reasons for carrying it out are analyzed.

Background: Child violence toward parentsis a

type of violence that has recently garnered great

social and scientic interest. The frequencyrates

found vary considerably (psychological violence

between 8.5% and 27% and physical violence

between 1.8% and 6.1%), in part due to the type

of assessment instruments used.

Method: A total of 1,543 young Spanish people

between 18 and 25 years of age (50.2% male;

Mage =19.2 years; SD =1.9) participated in this

study and reported on the frequency of violent

behavior toward parents when they were 12 and

17 years old.

Results: The results conrm a factorial struc-

ture of the CPV-Q, with four factors: psycho-

logical, physical, nancial, and control/domain.

The reasons for child-to-parent violence were

grouped into instrumental and reactive.

Conclusions: The CPV-Q for young people

presents adequate psychometric properties. The

high frequency rates of child-to-parent violence

justify the need to continue advancing the study

of this phenomenon.

Department of Psychology, Ofce C5-124, University of

Jaén, Spain, 23071 (mccano@ujaen.es).

Key Words: child-to-parent violence, frequency, psychomet-

ric properties, reasons, youth.

Implications: The CPV-Q is a useful instrument

for assessing child-to-parent violence for both

research and professional practice. It allows

evaluating the frequency of a wide range of vio-

lent behaviors and the underlying reasons moti-

vating this type of violence, which is of greathelp

for interventions.

Child violence directed toward parents is a phe-

nomenon that, although known for some time,

has experienced a notable increase in recent

years, becoming a serious social problem. In

Spain, data provided by the General Prosecu-

tor Ofce of Spain (2020) indicate that in recent

years, the gures for violence toward ascendants

remain high, reporting 5,055 judicial procedures

in 2019.

Child-to-parent violence (CPV) is understood

as any act of physical or psychological abuse

or nancial harm by children to parents through

which children gain power and control over the

parents (Cottrell, 2001). More recently, other

authors have emphasized that CPV acts are

repeated violent behaviors conducive to gaining

control, domination, and power toward the vic-

tim (Molla-Esparza & Aroca-Montolío, 2018).

A wide variety of behaviors reect different

types of CPV. Following Cottrell (2001), psy-

chological violence refers to those behaviors

intended to emotionally hurt parents (e.g., intim-

idating, running away from home, threatening)

and verbal behaviors (e.g., shouting, insulting,

challenging, and belittling). Following this

conceptualization, verbal violence would be

a subtype of psychological violence. Physical

1132 Family Relations 70 (October 2021): 1132–1149

DOI:10.1111/fare.12567

Child-to-Parent Violence 1133

violence refers to acts such as pushing, spit-

ting, kicking, and punching. Finally, nancial

violence includes behaviors such as stealing

money or parents’ belongings, selling parents’

possessions, destroying the home or parents’

belongings, demanding parents buy things they

do not feel they can afford, or incurring debts

the parents must cover, for example. The control

and domain toward parents is reected in some

behaviors such as making unrealistic demands

on parents (e.g., insisting they drop what they

are doing to comply with the child’s demands)

or controlling the running of the household.

This type of family violence presents some

peculiarities that make a difference with respect

to other types of violence (Brezina, 1999)

and other antisocial behaviors (Clemente &

Díaz, 2018; Espinosa & Clemente, 2011). In

recent years, numerous studies have evaluated

the effects of individual, familiar and social

factors on adolescents with CPV with different

groups (judicial, clinical, and community) and

from different countries. However, the scientic

literature on CPV is less abundant than other

types of family violence (e.g., Ma et al., 2016).

Regarding individual and psychological char-

acteristics, research highlights the role of hostile

attributions in the development of CPV (Calvete

et al., 2015; Contreras & Cano-Lozano, 2015,

2016a; Contreras et al., 2020). These adolescents

have high antisocial and low prosocial attitudes

(Contreras & Cano-Lozano, 2016b), poor school

performance, and other maladaptive behaviors

(Armstrong et al., 2018). Other studies have

revealed that these adolescents have emotional

difculties (Beckmann et al., 2017; Contreras &

Cano-Lozano 2016b) and that anger and impul-

sivity are fundamental variables in the develop-

ment of CPV (Calvete et al., 2011, 2015; Ibabe

et al., 2009).

Given that this type of violence appears

within the family context, many studies have

analyzed some variables related to family

structure and dynamics (e.g., Beckmann

et al., 2017; Contreras & Cano-Lozano, 2014,

2016a; Ibabe et al., 2013; Margolin & Bau-

com, 2014; Pagani et al., 2004, 2009). In

this regard, the exposure to family violence

is an important risk factor (e.g., Contreras &

Cano-Lozano, 2016a; Gámez-Guadix & Cal-

vete, 2012; Ibabe et al., 2009) together with

severe disciplinary styles, such as physical

and psychological punishment (e.g., Del Hoyo

et al., 2018; Gámez-Guadix et al., 2012) and

low parental warmth (Calvete et al., 2015;

Contreras & Cano-Lozano, 2014). Among the

contextual factors studied, research indicates

that CPV occurs in families in all socioeconomic

levels (Contreras & Cano-Lozano, 2014; Hong

et al., 2012) and also highlights the negative

inuence of deviant peers on CPV (e.g., Calvete

et al., 2011; Kennedy et al., 2010) and the link

between substance abuse and CPV (e.g., Arm-

strong et al., 2018; Contreras & Cano-Lozano,

2015; Ibabe et al., 2013).

On the other hand, some studies have doc-

umented the serious consequences of CPV

on the psychological adjustment of parents.

These consequences can be short term, such

as feelings of humiliation and uselessness,

anger, fear, guilt, shame, hopelessness, and the

need to distance themselves from their children

(Clarke et al., 2017; Desir & Karatekin, 2018;

Holt, 2011) and long term, such as parental

emotional distress and physical and mental

health problems (Holt, 2011).

F  CPV

In the study of the frequency of CPV, there are

large discrepancies due to the lack of a consen-

sual denition and the use of different criteria to

determine the presence and severity of the phe-

nomenon. Other factors that could be motivating

these discrepancies are the methodological dif-

ferences between studies. Thus, the informants

can be the parents or the children, the age range

of the aggressor varies, and the size and nature

of the sample (judicial, clinical or general pop-

ulation samples) or different assessment instru-

ments are used that evaluate different dimen-

sions of violence (Simmons et al., 2018).

As mentioned earlier, an especially important

aspect to take into account is the criterion used

to determine the presence of CPV. The presence

of CPV is a common criterion to use when vio-

lent behavior is carried out on at least one occa-

sion. In this case, in North America, with sam-

ples of adolescents from the general population,

frequency rates of verbal violence were found

between 8% and 64% and 6% and 13.8% for

physical violence (Margolin & Baucom, 2014;

Pagani et al., 2004, 2009). A frequency of ver-

bal violence of 45.3% and physical violence

of 5.5% have been found in Germany (Beck-

man et al., 2017). In Spain, psychological and

physical violence oscillate between 79.5% and

92% and between 7.2% and 19.1%, respectively