Child Maltreatment Typologies and Intimate Partner Violence: Findings From a Danish National Study of Young Adults.

The association between exposure to childhood maltreatment and subsequent intimate partner violence (IPV) has been well documented. Recently, there has been increased attention to IPV in adolescence and young adulthood, with studies demonstrating that IPV peaks in young adulthood. Data were collected from a Danish national study conducted by The Danish National Centre for Social Research in 2008 and 2009. A sample of 4,718 young adults (aged 24) was randomly selected using the total birth cohort of children born in 1984. Structured interviews were conducted with 2,980 participants equating to a response rate of 63%. Childhood maltreatment including emotional, sexual, and multiple abuse experiences and being female and a young parent were used to test the association with experiencing IPV victimization. Bivariate associations showed that all variables were significantly associated with experiencing IPV. When the variables were entered into a multivariate binary logistic regression analysis, being female indicated the strongest association (odds ratio [OR] = 13.96), followed by experiencing childhood sexual abuse (OR = 10.90) and experiencing multiple types of abuse (OR = 6.49). Results suggest that among the child maltreatment typologies, sexual abuse is the dominant factor associated with IPV. The current study extends the literature conducted on a young adult population by demonstrating that early adverse experiences and being female and a parent are associated with IPV in young adulthood. These findings suggest prevention programs should be targeted in early adolescence to support young people to establish and maintain positive and healthy relationships that promote safe conflict resolution strategies.