Domestic Violence and Control provides important longitudinal data on violent relationships and addresses the problem of violence from the perspective of both the perpetrator and the victim. The issue of control emerges as a central theme. Control plays a keyrole, firstly, in organizing the victim''s thoughts with regard to the batterer, and, secondly, in cases of repeated acts of violence over a length of time. The study shows acts of violence to be both "impulsive" and "instrumental" and thereby refutes competing explanations in the literature that violence is either "impulsive" or "instrumental."

Domestic Violence and Control provides important longitudinal data on violent relationships and addresses the problem of violence from the perspective of both the perpetrator and the victim. The issue of control emerges as a central theme. Control plays a keyrole, firstly, in organizing the victim''s thoughts with regard to the batterer, and, secondly, in cases of repeated acts of violence over a length of time. The study shows acts of violence to be both "impulsive" and "instrumental" and thereby refutes competing explanations in the literature that violence is either "impulsive" or "instrumental."