Culture of Violence Theory
In social psychology, domestic violence is an aggressive or violent behavior which occurs in a home setting and mainly involves married partners (Berns, 2017). Domestic violence is a common problem in our societies where many married partners have found themselves quarreling and raising different forms of violence due to different issues which bring some serious differences in their lives (Dutton, 2011). In this critical essay, we shall discuss domestic violence in details where we shall concentrate on some of the main theories which have been formulated to explain different aspects of domestic violence. The critical essay will be split into two main parts where the first part will state the main argument of the essay and come up with some evidence to support the main argument, while the second part will be the balanced argument part where some major points will be raised to criticize the main argument or raise some alternative views about the main argument of the critical essay. The main argument of our critical essay is that ‘some of our varying cultures are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies.’ The scope of our work (the critical essay) will cover different arguments and theories which have been given by different scholars in their attempt to explain the main causes of domestic violence in our society.
The culture of violence theory is one of the main psychosocial theories which support the argument that our varying cultures are the main causes of domestic violence in our societies. According to this theory, we have some societies which have some subcultures which have come with some norms which permit the use of domestic violence in our homes. This theory goes ahead to explain that we have some societies with some norms which allow women to be beaten by their husbands when they go wrong as a way of correcting them so that they won’t repeat the mistakes (Stewart and Simons, 2010, pp.569-605). These cultures and norms are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence as in most of the times the women will end up fighting back when hit by their husbands and this ends up escalating the cases of fights and violence between the married partners. This theory agrees with our main argument that some of our varying cultures are the main causes and promoters of domestic cultures in our societies since without such cultures and norms, the cases of domestic violence will be very few or absent in such societies. A key limitation of this research or theory is that it does not consider the societies which experience serious cases of domestic violence yet their cultures and norms strictly condemn the cases of domestic violence yet there are many such societies (Nisbett, 2018).
Evolutionary Theory
Another major psychosocial theory which supports the argument that our varying cultures are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies is the evolutionary theory. The evolutionary theory argues that the societies have changed from simple societies to highly complex societies which has resulted from the drastic changes undergone by our cultures, and this has made the families to become smaller and nuclear in their forms, and their relations have turned to be more structured thus becoming more ambiguous. These changes in the family structures and settings have ended up altering the parenting styles where many parents have adopted different parenting styles such as using corporal punishments against their kids, and all these unexpected changes have ended up increasing the cases of domestic violence in the societies in different ways (Glenn, Kurzban, and Raine, 2011, pp.371-380). According to the evolution theory, the changes of the cultures of different societies have played a great role in changing the parenting styles, and other family issues and these changes have in one way or another ended up promoting the cases of domestic violence in our societies. A key limitation of this research is that it doesn’t give convincing reasons as to why the changes in the family structures and parenting styles end up causing and promoting cases of domestic violence in our societies.
Another psychosocial theory which supports the argument that our varying cultures are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies is the feminist theory. The feminist theory argues that we have some cultures and some societies which generally take women to be inferior when compared to men and see no problem when females are abused violently by their male counterparts (Nye, 2013). According to these societies, men are the kings of the families are supposed to do whatever they want in their homes and are allowed even to use force or violence against their wives to have their demands met. The cultures in these societies have promoted violence in our societies greatly since they support men who raise violence in their homes, and in most cases, the wives of these men have ended up responding violently against these men. A key limitation of this research or theory is that it doesn’t consider some of the societies where both men and women are treated equally and yet we have many cases of domestic violence in these societies (Lange, Mitchell, and Bhana, 2012, pp.499-514).
Feminist Theory
The psychosocial theories discussed above support our main argument that some of our varying cultures are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies. However, we have some scholars who have come up with different views and different theories on the causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies. In this section, we shall consider the alternative views and the theories given by these scholars, and this will serve as a balanced argument for our critical essay.
The marital power theory is one of the psychosocial theories which argue that the cultures and the norms of our societies are not the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies, but instead, the marital powers possessed by men are the main causes and promoters. According to this psychosocial theory, the powers possessed by men, where the powers may be not only the physical strength but also the resources possessed by men are the main causes and promoters of domestic violence (Telalagic, 2012). Powerful men always tend to show off their powers (physical strength and resources) to their women and always feel to be superior to women and may cause unnecessary violence in their homes when they feel their wives don’t recognize and respect their powers. The critique of this research or theory is that it doesn’t consider the powerful men who do not show any form of violence in their homes, and we have many such men in different societies which mean this theory doesn’t apply to all the societies (Lawson, 2012, pp.572-590).
Another psychosocial theory which gives a different view on the main causes and promoters of domestic violence is the ecological theory. According to the ecological theory, the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies are some of the ecological factors or perspectives which affect different families. Some of the major ecological perspectives which may cause or promote domestic violence include a poor or a stressing social environment, a stressing family history, some bad social networks, among many other ecological perspectives or factors (Ali and Naylor, 2013, pp.611-619). A major critique of this research is that it generalizes all the families and doesn’t consider the peaceful families who have encountered many stressing ecological environments and have managed to withstand them all of them without having any problems of domestic violence.
Another main psychosocial theory which has alternative views on the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies is the bio-psychosocial perspective theory (Lawson and King, 2012, pp.517-534). According to this theory, the varying cultures and norms of different societies are not the main causes and promoters of domestic violence, but the main causes and promoters are the bio-psychosocial perspectives encountered by these families. Some of the major bio-psychosocial perspectives which greatly promotes domestic violence are the levels of stress experienced by the family, the quality of relationship which exist among the family members, the amount of income earned by the family members which in turn determines their quality of life, some antisocial tendencies possessed by some of the family members, among many other bio-psychosocial perspectives (Afolabi, 2014, pp.107-118). This theory argues that the kind of life a family lives highly determines if this family will keep on experiencing rampant cases of domestic violence. The families who live a poor and stressed kind of lifestyle tend to have more cases of domestic violence as compared to the families with better lifestyles and these increases cases of domestic violence are mainly caused by the bio-psychosocial perspectives or factors discussed above (Hague, Thiara, and Turner, 2011, pp.550-561). A major critique of this research is that we have many families who live stressed and poor lives and don’t experience cases of domestic violence, while there are many families who have better and prestigious lifestyles yet experience rampant cases of domestic violence, which means this research is not very accurate.
Alternative Views: Marital Power Theory
From the discussion above, it’s clear that different scholars have come with different theories to try and explain the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies. Although these scholars have different views on the main causes and promoters in our societies, they all agree that domestic violence is bad and is associated with many negative impacts on the affected families. Some of the major negative impacts of domestic violence on the affected families include causing physical injuries and pain which result from domestic fights, leaving the families hopeless in life, increasing the levels of stress to the affected families especially children and this increases their chances of suffering from depression, causing serious academic problems to the affected children who study as they can’t concentrate with their studies well when facing domestic problens in their homes, among many other negative impacts (Bancroft, Silverman, and Ritchie, 2011).
The critical essay teaches us much about domestic violence, especially its causes and promoters in our societies. The essay covers different theories which have been formulated by different scholars to explain the main causes and promoters of domestic violence in our societies, which is a major problem facing many societies in the world today.
The major reason why we have varying reasons given by different theories is that these theories were formulated by different scholars who researched different regions in the world and there are many causes of domestic violence which vary in different regions. Therefore, all the theories are correct as they were formulated by the researchers after doing detailed research in different regions and considering different perspectives. One last thing we should note that is domestic violence is bad and is associated with many negative impacts to the affected families, and so all the parents should try as much as possible to avoid it in their homes.
References
Afolabi, O. E. (2014). Domestic violence, risky family environment, and children: A bio-psychology perspective. International Journal of Psychology and Counselling, 6(8), 107-118.
Ali, P. A., & Naylor, P. B. (2013). Intimate partner violence: A narrative review of the feminist, social and ecological explanations for its causation. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 18(6), 611-619.
Bancroft, L., Silverman, J. G., & Ritchie, D. (2011). The batterer as parent: Addressing the impact of domestic violence on family dynamics. California: Sage Publications.
Berns, N. S. (2017). Framing the victim: Domestic violence, media, and social problems. London: Routledge.
Dutton, D. G. (2011). Rethinking domestic violence. Columbia: UBC Press.
Glenn, A. L., Kurzban, R., & Raine, A. (2011). Evolutionary theory and psychopathy. Aggression and violent behavior, 16(5), 371-380.
Hague, G., Thiara, R. K., & Turner, A. (2011, November). Bride-price and its links to domestic violence and poverty in Uganda: A participatory action research study. In Women’s studies international forum (Vol. 34, No. 6, pp. 550-561). Pergamon.
Lange, N., Mitchell, C., & Bhana, D. (2012). Voices of women teachers about gender inequalities and gender-based violence in rural South Africa. Gender and Education, 24(5), 499-514.
Lawson, J. (2012). Sociological theories of intimate partner violence. Journal of Human Behavior in the Social Environment, 22(5), 572-590.
Lawson, J., & King, B. (2012). Theories of violence: A review of textbooks on human behavior and the social environment. Journal of human behavior in the social environment, 22(5), 517-534.
Nisbett, R. E. (2018). The culture of honor: The psychology of violence in the South. London: Routledge.
Nye, A. (2013). Feminist theory and the philosophies of man. London: Routledge.
Stewart, E. A., & Simons, R. L. (2010). Race, code of the street, and violent delinquency: A multilevel investigation of neighborhood street culture and individual norms of violence. Criminology, 48(2), 569-605.
Telalagic, S. (2012). Domestic production as a source of marital power: theory and evidence from Malawi.
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