Discuss The Effects Of Domestic Violence On Children

The Effect Domestic Violence has on a Childs Behavior

Many things come to mind when the issue of domestic violence is being exposed to children. Things such as why did the dispute occur, how are the children feeling and can it be prevented in the future? Millions of children are exposed to domestic violence every year (Carlson 1984). In some forms children are being abused as well as the victim in the home where domestic violence is occurring. Whether is it physical, sexual, mental or verbal, these actions can affect a child’s life and how they function in the future. Studies show that children that have witnessed domestic violence or experienced abuse are at a higher risk of having psychological and behavior issues. These same issues can lead to permanent pain and agony that can affect a child in their future, which they will face for the rest of their lives. This research study integrates an ecological perspective and somewhat a theory in proposing how the effects of domestic violence on women parenting and children’s adjustment to this type of environment. There are many different forms of violence; domestic violence can be considered one of the worse. Many people would view domestic violence as a fight or think that it is somewhat common because every relationship has disagreements, but violence is certainly
not the answer. When dealing with young children, domestic violence can affect their growth and development. General functions are compromised by being exposed to domestic violence, such as social, emotional, behavioral, general health and cognitive. Over one hundred mega-analysis has been done to conclude, confirm and support the outcome of the effect domestic violence have on a child (Sternberg, 2006). This descriptive method was conducted based upon age, gender behavior problems and violence exposure from 15 studies, resulting in a data set of 1,870 subjects, ages 4-14 years (Sternberg, 2006). Different aspects were looked upon to find a method to support the hypothesis of how domestic violence affects children that have been exposed to it. Gender played a key role in this study; of course every number was different. It is evident; males were being exposed to violence more than females. It proved children that were exposed to domestic violence often effected with depression, delinquency, internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Even though studies show evidence of these effective outcomes of domestic violence and abuse exposure, every child will not have these issues. Positive judgment is that this analysis focused on the target group in which was selected and did not randomly select individuals. In many cases articles tend to use quantitative research which can lead to the sample not being specific. If I conducted a study I would lean more towards a qualitative research by being very open with smaller samples. In summary, this study showed different patterns of how domestic violence exposure to children can affect their behavior internalizing and externalizing manner.
The children that were exposed had a higher risk of problems during adolescents years and so on, that the children who were not. The different investigations aimed to support research on the both exposed children on the psychological outcomes in adolescents which will help me when I work with troubled teens and different in home services with families with violent history. It was conclude that children who are exposed to domestic violence are a risk of future
problems.

Works Cited

Moylan, C., Herrenkohl, T., Sousa, C., Tajima, E., Herrenkohl, R., & Russo, J. (2009). The effects of child abuse and exposure to domestic violence on adolescent internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. J Fam Viol, 25, 53-63.

Carlson, B. E. (1984) Children’s observations of interparental violence. In A. R. Roberts (Ed.), Battered women and their families (pp. 147-167)
Sternberg, K. J., L. P., Abbot, C. B., Lamb, M. E., &Guterman, E. (2006).
Type of violence, age, and gender differences in the effects of family violence on children’s behavior problems: a mega-analysis. Development Review, 26, 89-112.