Jeffrey A. Walsh

A Decade of Child-Initiated Family Violence Comparative Analysis of Child—Parent Violence and Parricide Examining Offender, Victim, and Event Characteristics in a National Sample of Reported Incidents, 1995-2005

This article examines 11 years (1995-2005) of National Incident Based Reporting System data comparing victim, offender, and incident characteristics for two types of child-initiated family violence: child—parent violence (CPV) and parricide. The objective is to better understand the victim—offender relationship for CPV and parricide and to highlight distinguishing features between the two offenses. This work extends the research and addresses shortcomings in the extant literature. Data analysis consists of chi-square tests and logistic regression. Findings suggest that CPV and parricide are distinct and unique crimes. In short, parricide offenders and victims are both older than CPV offenders and victims, with CPV offenders more likely to be female, more likely to be African American, and less likely to use a weapon than parricide offenders. The study calls for future research and exploration of preliminary support for a family violence escalation hypothesis.

Elderly in America: A Descriptive Study of Elder Abuse Examining National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) Data, 2000–2005

Elder abuse is the newest form of intrafamilial violence to garner the attention of the public, policy makers, health officials, researchers, and the criminal justice system. Despite evidence that elder abuse is a growing problem, there is little known about the phenomenon because of persistent limitations in the extant empirical work. The present study examined a large cross-national sample of reported incidents (n = 87,422) collected as part of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS), 2000–2005. Addressing limitations in prior works, this research employed a criminal justice oriented definition of elder abuse examining victim, offender, and incident characteristics using chi-square tests and logistic regression to establish baseline findings from a more comprehensive sample of data than previously existed. Results render a baseline profile of victims and abusers and suggest that gender differences prevail throughout elder abuse. This work both corroborates and contrasts past findings of elder abuse research, providing new insights and much needed baseline data.

Sibling Sexual Abuse: An Empirical Analysis of Offender, Victim, and Event Characteristics in National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) Data, 2000-2007.

Sibling sexual abuse is identified as the most common form of familial sexual abuse. Extant literature is plagued by definitional inconsistencies, data limitations, and inadequate research methodology. Trivialized as “normal” sexual exploration, sibling sexual abuse has been linked to psychosocial/psychosexual dysfunction. Research has relied on retrospective, convenience, and/or homogenous samples. This work drew on eight years of National Incident-Based Reporting System data (2000–2007) to provide aggregate level baseline information. This work extended prior research exploring victim-, offender-, and incident-based characteristics. Results highlight the need for expanded definitional criteria relating to both age and gender to better inform risk assessment and prevention. Findings both corroborate and contrast prior work and suggest victim- and offender-based gender differences.

Predicting Decade-Long Changes in Community Motor Vehicle Theft Rates Impacts of Structure and Surround

Motor vehicle theft (MVT) is arguably the most underresearched Part I crime. This work predicts long-term changes in community MVT rates, extrapolating from earlier work in community fabric and changing personal crime and delinquency rates and cross-sectional work on MVT. Police data on MVTs generated MVT rates in one Midwestern city in 1990-1991 and 2000-2001 that were linked with census block group data. MVT rates went up later in communities more racially mixed initially and in those surrounded by initially higher MVT rates, suggesting extant community structure and surrounding crime generate subsequently unfolding impacts on MVT. A second series of models links changing MVT rates with contemporaneously increasing racial heterogeneity, decreasing community instability, and increasing surrounding MVT rates. Some associations between community structure and changing delinquency or crime appear relevant to shifting MVT rates. Resident-based, target-linked, and offender-dependent processes to be investigated are outlined.

Examining the nexus between domestic violence and animal abuse in a national sample of service providers

Companion animals play a complex role in families impacted by violence. An outlet of emotional support for victims, the family pet often becomes a target for physical abuse. Results from a comprehensive e-survey of domestic violence shelters nationwide (N = 767) highlight both improvements and existing gaps in service provision for domestic violence victims and their pets. Quantitative and qualitative data noted frequently encountered obstacles to successful shelter seeking by abuse victims with companion animals including a lack of availability, funding, space, and reliable programming. Although results indicate an overall improvement in organizational awareness, fewer than half of surveyed shelters include intake questions about animals. Continued awareness and an expansion of services is needed to create viable safety planning strategies and reliable alternatives for women with companion animals in order to improve the likelihood that abuse victims will seek escape and refuge for themselves, their children, and their pets.

Innocence Lost: A Gender-Based Study of Parricide Offender, Victim, and Incident Characteristics in a National Sample, 1976–2003

ABSTRACT The act of parricide is one of the least understood and most underresearched acts of family violence. Work to date suggests adolescent parricide is often an extreme response to intolerable abuse. Drawing on Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR) from 1976 to 2003, this work examines a large national sample of reported parricide incidents (N = 2,599) with an offender 21 years of age or younger. A gender-based study of offender, victim, and incident characteristics was undertaken using bivariate and multivariate techniques. Results suggest that incidents of parricide are decreasing over time. Offenses are predominantly intraracial with white male offenders peaking in late adolescence and white females peaking in mid-adolescence. White biological fathers are at greatest risk of victimization with girls significantly more likely than boys to kill a stepfather. Results both corroborate and contrast extant works, providing new baseline data and insight into this complex and dynamic crime.

Assessing autonomous learning in research methods courses: Implementing the student-driven research project

As empirical assessments of teaching strategies increase in many disciplines and across many different courses, a paucity of such assessment seems to exist in courses devoted to social science research methods. This lack of assessment and evaluation impedes progress in developing successful teaching pedagogy. The teaching— learning issue addressed here incorporates active learning teaching strategies with autonomous student learning. The strategy was implemented in research methods courses with inherently complex material not conducive to passive teaching and learning strategies. This work implemented a pre/post-test assessment of undergraduate students in a research methods course who participated in a semester-long tiered-assignment research project. Findings suggest that students’ learning preferences increased over the semester for each type inquired; students felt, upon completion of the semester, that they could conduct a research project if asked to do so; their interest in research methods and appreciation for the subject increased over the semester; and they enjoyed learning about their peers’ behavior.

Eldercide: A Gendered Examination of Elderly Homicide in the United States, 2000-2005:

Eldercide is an increasing category of homicide affecting members of one of society’s most vulnerable populations. Despite attention from health officials, policy makers, researchers, the public, and the criminal justice system, there remains a dearth of knowledge about the phenomenon. Examination of extant empirical works reveals overreliance on small localized subsamples drawn frequently from medical examiner reports, underutilization of large national samples, brief temporal spans of data, and diffuse victim and offender profiles. This work, examining a large sample of reported incidents collected as part of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) for the period 2000-2005, addresses several limitations.This research examines victim, offender, and incident characteristics using chi-square tests and logistic regression to establish baseline findings and victim/offender profiles from a more comprehensive sample of data than prior studies have employed. Furthermore, the work examines the role of gender as a key to the dichotomy that exists in the literature between stranger-oriented eldercide and family violence—oriented eldercide. Results suggest notable gender differences with White males being the most frequent victims of eldercide, killed predominantly by offenders below the age of 45 compared to female victims who are most frequently killed by offenders above 45 years of age. Males are also more likely to be killed by a stranger compared to females who are most likely to be killed by a spouse or child. This work both corroborates and contrasts prior findings providing new insights and avenues for future study.

Filicide: A gendered profile of offender, victim, and event characteristics in a national sample of reported incidents, 1995–2009

Filicide is the intentional act of a parent killing their own child. Encompassing both neonaticide (victims less than a day old), and infanticide (victims less than a year old), filicide is often defined to include biological and stepparents as offenders with victims under the age of 18. As the risk of becoming a victim of homicide is greatest during the first year of life, and parents or stepparents are the most likely perpetrators, there is a pressing need for further research in this area. Existing work has been limited by definitional variation, small sample sizes, and inconsistent or conflicting findings. Furthermore, there is a notable lack of research incorporating a comparison of maternal versus paternal filicide. The present exploratory and descriptive study examines a large sample of reported incidents, using 15 years of National Incident-Based Reporting System data (1995 to 2009), to provide a much needed and more comprehensive source of aggregate-level baseline information on this understudied violent crime. Presenting a comparison of maternal and paternal filicide, basic demographic characteristics including victim/offender age, sex and race are explored in relation to incident characteristics including, substance abuse, location, and weapon usage.

My brother's reaper: examining officially reported siblicide incidents in the United States, 2000-2007

With higher rates than any other form of intrafamilial violence, Hoffman and Edwards (2004) note, sibling violence “constitutes a pandemic form of victimization of children, with the symptoms often going unrecognized and the effect ignored” (p. 187). Approximately 80% of children reside with at least one sibling (Kreider, 2008), and in its most extreme form sibling violence manifests as siblicide. Siblicide is poorly understood with fewer than 20 empirical studies identified in the extant literature since 1980 (see Eriksen & Jensen, 2006). The present work employs 8 years of Supplemental Homicide Report (SHR) data, 2000–2007, with siblicide victims and offenders age 21 years and younger, to construct contemporary victim and offender profiles examining incident characteristics. Findings highlight the sex-based nature of the offense with unique victimization patterns across victims and offenders. Older brothers using a firearm are the most frequent offenders against both male and female siblings. Strain as a theoretical foundation of siblicide is offered as an avenue for future inquiry.