Children hitting mothers is a type of violence that has largely been ignored, in research on violence against women. It is sometimes mentioned in clinical studies of battered women within the conceptual framework of a son following the battering example of the father. This pattern might also apply to children in the general population because many of them also have the example of a father who physically assaults their mother (Gelles and Straus, 1988; Straus, Gelles, and Steinmetz, 1980). Consistent with that hypothesis, a study of a general population sample by Cornell and Gelles (1982) found that sons were more likely to hit mothers who were victims of partner violence: The objective of this research is to further investigate child-to-parent violence (CPV), especially violence against mothers, and whether violence by fathers against: mothers is associated with an increased probability of children hitting their mother. We will first present data on the percent of children who physically attack mothers and fathers and how this differs for boys and by girls, and for children of different ages. Then the relation of CPV to two aspects of violence by parents will be presented: violence between parents, and violence by parents against children in the form of corporal punishment and also more severe violence against children. The extent to which CPV is unique to the victimization of women will-be investigated by examining both child-to-mother and child-to-father violence. The theoretical basis for expecting a link between CPV and these two aspects of violence by parents includes social learning theory, reciprocal-coercion theory, and feminist theory. We believe that the processes leading to CPV identified by these theories are complementary. Social learning (Bandura, 1971; Bandura and Walters, 1959), is part of the process because children growing up in violent households witness violence between the parents. Thus, children have models of violent behavior to follow in dealing with their parents. Reciprocal-coercion is likely to be part of the process leading to CPV because many children are victims of coercive violence by parents in the form of corporal punishment. Patterson and colleagues found that corporal punishment tends to be part of a more general pattern of coercive social relationships. This sets in motion an escalating pattern of increasingly coercive interaction in which the child who is the object of coercion tends to become resentful, hostile, coercive, and ultimately physically violent to the parent (Patterson, 1982; 1995). Feminist theory identifies socially structured encouragement of violence by males and the unequal division of childcare and household tasks that put mothers at greater risk of being physically attacked by children (Renzetti and Curran, 1999:165; Rossi and Rossi, 1990). In addition to helping to understand violence toward women, information on CPV is also important because there is a clear cultural norm, which defines, hitting parents as a particularly outrageous behavior. Consequently, the rate of CPF provides information on the degree to which an important cultural norm concerning the family is observed and violated. Many parents, upon experiencing CPV, feel shame or distress. Ironically, because it is such a severe normative transgression, CPV is more likely than other misbehavior to result in violence by parents in the form of corporal punishment (Sears, Maccoby, and Levin, 1957).
