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Familial Violence

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Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science

Synonyms

Child abuse; Domestic violence; Sibling violence

Definition

Physical, psychological, or sexual violence between parents, offspring, siblings, and partners within a kinship structure.

Introduction

Just as Hamilton’s rule can be used to describe the weighing of evolutionary costs and benefits as applied to determining the likelihood of altruistic behavior among kin, it can similarly predict the likelihood of aggression between close relatives (Buss 1999). This violence is predicted through the variables of degrees of shared kinship and reproductive value (RV). These, in addition to the availability of resources necessary to survival, explain many present patterns of within-kin relationships.

Parent-Offspring Violence

Step-Parents

Research has supported the hypothesis that stepchildren are at a higher risk of abuse and homicide, a phenomenon coined the “Cinderella effect” (Daly and Wilson 1985). Further illustrating this pattern, among parents who have both biologically related...

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References

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Correspondence to Janicka T. Burgess .

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Burgess, J., Jex, C. (2017). Familial Violence. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_1866-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_1866-1

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