What Women Think and What Men Think Women Think

Perceptions of Abuse and Kindness in Dating Relationships

Bibliographic Data

ID13671569
AuthorsIrene Gillman Bruschi (Hofstra University, corresponding author), Beth Raymond (Hofstra University)
Year1990
Volume67
Issue1
Pages115-128
Publication date1990-08-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenuePsychological Reports (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0033-2941 • E-ISSN: 1558-691X
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.2466/pr0.1990.67.1.115
PMID2236388
OpenAlexW1995119655
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited22

The purpose of this study was to investigate how college women and their boyfriends viewed their relationships in terms of both abuse and kindness. The women filled out the Psychology Abuse-Kindness Relationship Inventory for themselves and their boyfriends responded to the questionnaire as they thought their girlfriends would. Several intriguing findings resulted: (1) Men thought their girlfriends would respond more negatively about the relationship than the women actually did. (2) Certain aspects of the relationship resulted in more discrepancies between the men's and women's perceptions. (3) Women distinguished present from past relationships by describing the former as more positive and the latter as more negative; men made no such distinction. Alternative explanations were offered to account for these results including projection, denial, projective identification, lack of psychological separation within couples, men's emotional upbringing and deeply rooted feelings towards women

Denial · Developmental psychology · Feeling · Kindness · Perception · Projective identification · Psychoanalysis · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Intimate Partner and Family Violence · Psychology · Sexual Assault and Victimization Studies · Social Psychology

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