Citation

Duncan A, Thomas JC, Miller C. J. Fam. Violence 2005; 20(4): 235-239.

Affiliation

School of Professional Psychology, Pacific University, Forest Grove, Oregon; School of Professional Psychology, Pacific University, Portland, Oregon; School of Professional Psychology, Pacific University, 511 SW 10th Avenue, Fourth Floor, Portland, Oregon

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10896-005-5987-9

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The literature suggests that physical child abuse, sexual child abuse, paternal alcoholism, paternal unavailability, and domestic violence may be significant in development of childhood animal cruelty. Two groups of early- to late adolescent boys (CTA and N-CTA) in residential treatment for conduct disorder were compared in the current study on histories of these family risk factors. The adolescents in Group 1 were comprised of boys who had conduct problems with documented histories of animal cruelty (n = 50; CTA). Group 2 consisted of adolescent boys (n = 50; N-CTA) with conduct problems, but without documented histories of animal cruelty. Results showed that children in the CTA group had significantly greater histories of physical and/or sexual child abuse and domestic violence in comparison to children in the N-CTA group. These results suggest that physical and/or sexual abuse to a child, and exposure to domestic violence, may be significant in the development of childhood animal cruelty.