Table 4.
Abusive parents who experienced abuse as children
| Reference | Study description | Results | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Altemeier et al. [2] | 1400 low-income mothers interviewed while pregnant; followed prospectively; 23 subsequently abused their children | 17% were beaten more than two times by parents; 9% saw a doctor for a beating by a parent; 43% were punished by abuse as children | No statistically significant difference between mothers who abused their children and those who did not in these areas |
| Baldwin and Oliver [3] | Retrospective case-control and prospective case reports; 38 children from 34 families; severe abuse | 41% of parents were abused as children | |
| Disbrow et al. [14] | Case-control; 37 abusive families 32 control subjects; matched for age of child, and age, education, race, and relationship status of mother | Abusive parents more likely to have been abused as children | This was a statistically significant difference Tau coefficient 0.40 |
| Egeland et al. [15] | Prospective longitudinal study of 267 primiparous women; low socioeconomic group; 161 women interviewed when her child was 48 or 54 months old | 47 of 161 mothers were abused as children; 18 of the 47 women abused their children; 12 did not and 12 were “borderline” | |
| Haapasalo and Aaltonen [21] | 25 mothers who had had contact with child protective services (CPS) and 25 who had not; matched for mothers’ and children’s ages and gender, and number of children | All mothers in CPS group reported a history of physical abuse; 23 of 25 reported a history of physical abuse in the non-CPS group | |
| Hunter et al. [23] | Prospective review of 255 premature births with abuse rate of 3.9% | 90% of the families in the abuse group had a family history of abuse or neglect compared with 17% in the no abuse group | This was a statistically significant difference |
| Smith and Adler [44] | Case-control; controlled for social class; 45 hospitalized abused children | 47% of mothers and 33% of fathers in the abuse group had a history of abuse compared with 16% and 13%, respectively in the control group | Both were statistically significant differences |
| Smith and Hanson [45] | 214 parents of battered infants and children less than 5; 53 control subjects | No difference in incidence in abuse as children |