Family Violence Theory

Previous and current sociology scholars have come up with several theories to answer the question "why do men use violence?". Up to this day, it is believed that current sociological literatures are divided into three perspectives: family violence perspective, feminist perspective and integrative perspective. This paper upholds an integrated theory of resource theory, feminist perspective and socio-demographic perspective. In this paper, we situated the theory in Chinese society and selected five cases based on Oral Accounts of Battered Women in China to test the validity of the theory. The findings confirm the theory and further suggest that the domestic violence should be regarded as a problem from a societal level. In other words, tackling

This section starts with a brief summary of theories proposed from family violence perspective. The system theory, as Stratus(1973) put it, "views continuing violence as a systematic product rather than a product of individual behavior pathology." Specifically, the system theory proposes that the positive feedback encourages violent behavior while negative feedback restrains the use of violence.
Belsky's(1980) ecological model of human development was first applied to understanding of domestic violence by Carlosn (1984) and was later adopted by a variety of theorists including Dutton(2006). Specifically, as Dutton suggested, there are four spheres of milieus that are influential to an individual's behavior: The macrosystem is composed of "broad cultural values and belief systems"(p.19); the exosystem is composed of the groups and institutions (such as school, work, peers, and church) that connect the family to the larger environment; the microsystem is the family unit itself-the immediate context that surrounds the individual; and finally, ontogenetic factors refer to an individual’s personal development, and they "define what a particular individual’s unique developmental history

Anderson(1997) believed that both men's socio-demographic status and husbands' comparative resource to their wives would influence men's use of violence. A more detailed explanation would be provided in the description of the theory down below.
Heise(1998) integrated the ecological theory with feminist perspective. Heise adopted the ecological framework that encompasses the findings that could possibly result in domestic violence but pointed out gender should be taken into account as well. She proposed that patriarchal society and social and individual factors together influence one's behavior. Unilateral explanation, especially viewing the use of violence solely from the feminist perspective, would not be adequate.
Michael Johnson(1995) believed that violence should be divided into two types: patriarchal violence and common couple violence. The patriarchal violence derives from the patriarchal society and often includes "violence, economic subordination, threats, isolation and other control tactics"(p.284). In comparison, common couple violence is less gender-based and is believed to occur under situations where conflicts sometimes get out of hand. Common couple violence is considered to happen less frequently and "more rarely escalate into serious, sometimes even life threatening, forms of