ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Community Matters: Intimate Partner Violence Among RuralYoung Adults

Katie M. Edwards • Marybeth J. Mattingly •

Kristiana J. Dixon • Victoria L. Banyard

Published online: 29 January 2014

� Society for Community Research and Action 2014

Abstract Drawing on social disorganization theory, the

current study examined the extent to which community-

level poverty rates and collective efficacy influenced indi-

vidual reports of intimate partner violence (IPV) perpetra-

tion, victimization, and bystander intervention among a

sample of 178 young adults (18–24; 67.4 % women) from

16 rural counties across the eastern US who completed an

online survey that assessed demographic information, IPV

perpetration, victimization, bystander intervention, and

collective efficacy. We computed each county’s poverty

rate from the 2007–2011 American Community Survey.

Generalized estimating equations demonstrated that after

controlling for individual-level income status, community-

level poverty positively predicted IPV victimization and

perpetration for both men and women. Collective efficacy

was inversely related to IPV victimization and perpetration

for men; however, collective efficacy was unrelated to IPV

victimization and perpetration for women. Whereas IPV

bystander intervention was positively related to collective

efficacy and inversely related to individual-level income

status for both men and women, community-level poverty

was unrelated to IPV bystander intervention for both men

and women. Overall, these findings provide some support

for social disorganization theory in explaining IPV among

rural young adults, and underscore the importance of multi-

level IPV prevention and intervention efforts focused

around community-capacity building and enhancement of

collective efficacy.

Keywords Intimate partner violence � Bystander

intervention � Rural � Poverty � Collective efficacy � Social

disorganization

Intimate partner violence (IPV) occurs at alarmingly high

rates in US society, especially among adolescents and

young adults, which make it especially important to

understand patterns of victimization and perpetration

among this group (Black et al. 2011). Given the high rates

and deleterious consequences of IPV, there is increased

focus on understanding the correlates and predictors of IPV

perpetration, IPV victimization, and IPV bystander inter-

vention (i.e., individuals who engage in behaviors that aid

in the prevention of IPV and/or assist in victims’ recovery

from IPV experiences; Banyard 2011) in order to inform

prevention and intervention efforts. Although most

research to date has focused on the individual (e.g.,

accepting attitudes towards IPV) and relational (e.g., peer

group norms towards IPV) correlates and predictors of

aspects of IPV listed above, researchers are increasingly

recognizing the critical role of community context in

understanding, responding to, and preventing IPV (see

Cunradi 2010; Mancini et al. 2006). However, to date, most

of this research has been conducted within urban commu-

nities (see Pinchevsky and Wright 2012 for a review);

significantly less research has focused on IPV within rural

communities. Given preliminary research documenting

rural–urban differences in IPV [e.g., rural victims reported

less social support and more barriers to reporting and help-

seeking than urban victims (Logan et al. 2005, 2003)],

research is sorely needed to better understand the

K. M. Edwards (&) � K. J. Dixon � V. L. Banyard

Department of Psychology, University of New Hampshire,

Durham, NH 03824, USA

e-mail: katie.edwards@unh.edu

M. J. Mattingly

Department of Sociology and The Carsey Institute, University of

New Hampshire, Durham, NH, USA

123

Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207

DOI 10.1007/s10464-014-9633-7

community-level correlates of IPV in rural communities,

especially among high risk and understudied groups such

as young adults. Drawing on social disorganization theory

(Shaw and McKay 1942; Pinchevsky and Wright 2012),

the current study examined the extent to which community-

level poverty rates and collective efficacy (i.e., social

cohesion among community members) influenced indi-

vidual reports of IPV perpetration, victimization, and

bystander intervention among a sample of young men and

women living in 16 rural counties across the eastern United

States (US).

Social disorganization theory (Shaw and McKay 1942)

provides a framework to understand the role that structural

economic indicators and neighborhood compositional factors

have on crime. According to the original theory and later

reformulations (e.g., Sampson and Groves 1989; Sampson and

Wilson 1995), communities characterized by high levels of

poverty and low levels of collective efficacy are likely to have

high crime rates because of the community’s inability to exert

formal and informal social control. Whereas social disorga-

nization theory has been applied primarily to crimes such as

burglary, robbery, and stranger assaults, more recently it has

been applied to interpersonal violence, including IPV (see

Pinchevsky and Wright 2012, for a review). Specific to social

disorganization conceptualizations of IPV, living in an

impoverished community may increase risk for IPV through a

number of mechanisms. For example, high poverty in a com-

munity may increase stress among couples, which increases

risk for IPV. High poverty rates may also be associated with

distrust in and cynicism towards the justice system, which may

decrease the likelihood that victims will seek help for IPV (thus

increasing risk for re-victimization) (Plass 1993; Pinchevsky

and Wright 2012; Ross and Mirowsky 2009; Sampson and

Bartusch 1998). In addition to the role of community-level

poverty, collective efficacy may increase bystander interven-

tion as well as victims’ likelihood of seeking help, which could

lead to overall lower rates of IPV within a community

(Browning 2002; Pinchevsky and Wright 2012).

Previous research has examined empirically the effects of

community-level poverty and collective efficacy on IPV and

findings suggest that community-level poverty and broader

measures of community disadvantage (i.e., concentration of

poor, single-parent families, and unemployed racial minori-

ties; Wilson 1987) are positively associated with individual

reports of IPV victimization and perpetration (see Pinchevsky

and Wright 2012 for a review of studies). However, most of

this research has been conducted with urban communities.

One exception is work by Lanier and Maume (2009) who

found that community disadvantage was unrelated to female

IPV victimization in rural communities; however, male

unemployment measured at the individual-level was related to

female IPV victimization. Several studies including rural

samples have documented the positive relationships between

community-level poverty and IPV-related homicide and

femicide (Beyer et al. 2013; Madkour et al. 2010). In light of

all the research with urban communities demonstrating con-

sistent relationships between community-level poverty/

disadvantage and IPV and mixed findings with rural com-

munities between community-level poverty and IPV vari-

ables, more research with rural communities is needed to

determine whether similar patterns exist in rural communities

(Pinchevsky and Wright 2012).

In addition to community-level poverty and disadvantage,

collective efficacy has been studied in conjunction with IPV,

although to a lesser extent. Of the studies that exist, pre-

liminary research generally suggests that collective efficacy

serves as a protective factor against IPV victimization and

perpetration (see Pinchevsky and Wright 2012 for a review

of studies). However, the research is somewhat equivocal

with some studies finding null relationships between col-

lective efficacy and IPV (e.g., Frye 2007). Only two known

studies have specifically examined collective efficacy and

IPV within rural communities (DeKeseredy and Schwartz

2009; Lanier and Maume 2009). Whereas, Lanier and

Maume (2009) found that social support measured at the

individual-level was associated with a significantly lower

likelihood of female IPV victimization in quantitative

analyses, in a qualitative study of rural IPV victims of post-

separation sexual assault, Dekeseredy and Schwartz (2009)

found that 84 % of victims stated that they could not count

on their neighbors to help them solve personal problems.

DeKeseredy and Schwartz (2009) argued that high levels of

collective self-efficacy typically found in rural communities

may function to prevent some violent crimes (e.g., vandal-

ism), but not others, like IPV. Indeed, what may be per-

ceived as the ‘‘common good’’ among individuals in rural

communities may actually include behaviors that ignore or

even encourage IPV (DeKeseredy and Schwartz 2009) or

that discourage victims from coming forward to accuse

perpetrators who hold high levels of social capital in a close

knit community (DeKeseredy and Schwartz 2009). To date,

however, the research lacks a comprehensive understanding

of the role of collective efficacy on IPV victimization, IPV

perpetration, and IPV bystander intervention among rural

young adults.

The above findings support a social disorganization

framework particularly for middle and older aged adults

living in urban communities; these individuals have been

the main focus of research on this topic to date. Far less

research has examined the role of community-level pov-

erty/disadvantage and collective efficacy in IPV among

younger samples. Although they did not measure commu-

nity-level poverty and collective efficacy specifically,

Banyard et al. (2006) did find that low school attachment

and low neighborhood monitoring were associated with

increased self-reports of IPV perpetration in a sample of

Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207 199

123

middle and high school students across several rural and

urban communities. However, these variables were not

significant predictors of IPV perpetration in more complex

multivariate analyses. More research is needed on late

adolescents and young adults and that focuses more spe-

cifically on rural contexts.

Furthermore, most IPV research to date, including

research on community-level correlates of IPV, has focused

primarily on girls and women as IPV victims and boys and

men as IPV perpetrators. However, we know from previous

research that IPV victimization and perpetration rates are

similar among girls/women and boys/men and that IPV

tends to be mutual and bidirectional, especially in samples

of adolescents and young adults (see Dardis et al. 2014 for a

review). Thus, it is critical that research on the community-

level correlates of IPV include methodologies in which both

girls/women and boys/men are comprehensively assessed on

measures of IPV victimization, IPV perpetration, and IPV

bystander intervention. Broadening measures of IPV to

include both men and women as perpetrators, victims, and

bystanders is especially important in light of preliminary

research with urban youth showing that neighborhood

characteristics affect boy’s perpetration of IPV more so than

girl’s perpetration of IPV (Jain et al. 2010).

The purpose of the current study was to explore these gaps

in the literature by applying aspects of social disorganization

theory to explain IPV victimization, IPV perpetration, and

IPV bystander intervention among a sample of young adults

(18–24) living in rural counties across the eastern US. Social

disorganization variables used were county poverty rates and

individual perceptions of collective efficacy. We chose to

focus on county-level poverty because data constraints often

preclude analyses at smaller geographies, particularly in rural

places. We generally hypothesized that counties with higher

poverty rates would also have higher rates of IPV victim-

ization and perpetration. While empirical findings have been

mixed regarding the relationship between collective efficacy

and IPV within rural communities, social disorganization

theory predicts that lower perceived collective efficacy will

be associated with higher reports of victimization and per-

petration and less helpful bystander action. Given the dearth

of research on the moderating role of gender in the rela-

tionship between community-level variables and IPV vari-

ables among rural young adults, we had no a priori

hypotheses about these relationships.

Method

Participants

Two hundred three young adults (67.4 % women and

32.6 % men) from 16 rural counties across the eastern

United States completed an online survey (see Procedure

section for recruitment details). Eligibility criteria required

that participants lived in one of the 16 target rural counties

for at least four years. A minority of respondents (n = 25

out of 203; 12 %) were excluded from the analyses due to

missing data on gender and/or income as well as partici-

pants who had missing data on all IPV outcome measures

(i.e., IPV victimization, IPV perpetration, IPV bystander

intervention).

Sixty-four percent of the sample was from New Eng-

land, and 36 % of the sample was from the Southern US

including Appalachia. Based on inclusion criteria, all par-

ticipants were between the ages of 18 and 24, and the

average age was 21.05 (SD = 1.93). The sample largely

identified as Caucasian (94.4 %) and heterosexual

(88.7 %). Twenty-three point six percent of the sample

reported less than $10,000 in annual family income,

29.7 % of the sample reported between $10,000 and

$30,000, 19.6 % of the sample reported between $31,000

and $50,000, 15.2 % of the sample reported between

$51,000 and $75,000, and 11.8 % reported more than

$76,000. Over one-third (39.9 %) of the sample reported

being employed part time, 30.3 % reported being

employed full time, 20.8 % reported being unemployed

and seeking work, and 9.0 % reported not working or

seeking work. Regarding the highest level of education to

date, 4.5 % reported some high school, 3.9 % reported a

GED, 17.4 % reported a high school diploma, 53.4 %

reported some college, 6.2 % reported an associate’s

degree, 1.1 % reported a trade vocational degree, 12.9 %

reported a bachelor’s degree, and\1 % reported a master’s

degree. Regarding relationship status, 36.5 % of the sample

was single/never married, 31.5 % were in a dating rela-

tionship and not cohabiting, 19.1 % were in a dating

relationship and cohabiting, 11.8 % were married, and

1.1 % were divorced/separated/other. Nearly one in five

participants (18.7 %) of the sample had at least one child.

Measures

Demographics

A questionnaire was included to assess relevant demo-

graphic information discussed in the participant section

above. Two items from this measure, gender and annual

family income, were included as control variables in the

inferential analyses. For gender, participants identifying as

men were coded zero and participants identifying as

women were coded one. The scores on the annual family

income item were dichotomized with zero representing

low-income individuals (i.e., under $30,000 per year) and

one representing middle and high income individuals (i.e.,

over $30,000 per year).

200 Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207

123

Community-Level Poverty Rate

The community-level poverty rate was obtained from the

2007–2011 American Community Survey (ACS) con-

ducted by the US Census Bureau for each of the 16

counties (US Census Bureau 2011a). As defined in the

ACS, community-level poverty was operationalized to

include the percentage of the tract’s population below the

official poverty line, $22,811 for a family comprised of two

non-elderly adults and two children in 2011 (US Census

Bureau 2011b). Across the 16 counties county-level pov-

erty ranged from less than 10 % to nearly 40 %.

Collective Efficacy

Collective efficacy was measured using a widely-used

scale developed and previously validated by Morenoff and

Sampson (1997). Participants responded to the five items

(e.g., ‘‘this is a close-knit neighborhood,’’ ‘‘people around

here are willing to help their neighbors’’) on a 1 (Not at all

True) to 5 (Completely True) scale. Higher scores indicated

greater levels of collective efficacy. In the current sample,

Cronbach’s alpha was 0.89.

IPV Victimization and Perpetration

The physical victimization and perpetration subscales of the

Revised Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS2; Straus et al. 1996)

were used to identify men and women who had experienced

physical IPV victimization and perpetration in the past year.

Twelve items assessed physical IPV victimization (e.g., ‘‘my

partner pushed or shoved me’’), and the same 12 items were

used to assess physical IPV perpetration (e.g., ‘‘I pushed or

shoved my partner’’). Response options for each of the items

ranged from Never (0) to More than 20 times (6). Responses

were summed separately for the physical IPV victimization

and perpetration subscales so that participants received an

overall count score for both physical IPV victimization and

perpetration. Response options were also dichotomized in

order to determine the 12-month incidence rates of both

physical IPV victimization and perpetration.

IPV Bystander Intervention

The seven IPV items from Banyard and Moynihan’s (2011)

Bystander Behavior Scale were used to determine the extent

to which individuals actually intervened in IPV situations

during the past year. Participants responded ‘‘yes’’ (coded

1) or ‘‘no’’ (coded 0) to items (e.g., ‘‘Approach a friend if I

thought they were in an abusive relationship and let them

know that I’m here to help’’ and ‘‘If I heard a friend

insulting their partner I would say something to them’’).

Responses were summed so that higher scores reflected

greater levels of IPV bystander intervention behavior. In the

current sample, Cronbach’s alpha was 0.85.

Procedure

Participants were recruited from 16 rural counties (Rural–

Urban Continuum Codes 4–9; US Department of Agriculture

2013) in New England and the Southern US (including Ap-

palachia). The counties were chosen based on demographic

and geographic variability. Participants within each of the 16

rural counties were recruited through a variety of mediums,

including (a) emails distributed to students at local com-

munity, technical, and 4-year colleges (46 %) (b) flyers

posted at local businesses and organizations (e.g., library)

(30 %), (c) word of mouth/snowball sampling (11 %),

(d) online advertisements (e.g., Facebook, Craigslist) (7 %),

and (e) print newspaper advertisements (6 %). Participants

were directed to an online survey hosted by SurveyMon-

key� where participants first read an online consent form.

Participants who met criteria (i.e., were between the ages of

18 and 24, currently lived in one of the 16 counties, and had

lived in this county for at least 4 years) and consented to

participate completed an online survey that included the

measures listed above. Following completion of the survey,

participants received debriefing and referral information that

was county-specific. Participants also had the opportunity to

be redirected to a different website in order to enter their

name and contact information for a chance to win one of

several $100 gift cards. Participants were made aware of the

anonymous nature of their survey responses during the

informed consent process in order to encourage honest

responding. All research was conducted in compliance with

the university’s Institutional Review Board.

Results

Descriptive Statistics

Means and standard deviations for IPV count variables and

collective efficacy are presented in Table 1. Rates of IPV

victimization and IPV perpetration are presented in

Table 2. Of the individuals reporting any type of IPV

during the past year, over half (62.5 %) reported both IPV

victimization and perpetration, 22.9 % reported victim-

ization only, and 14.6 % reported perpetration only.

Inferential Statistics

Analytic Overview

In order to examine the role of community-level poverty

and collective efficacy on IPV perpetration, IPV

Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207 201

123

victimization, and IPV bystander intervention we used

generalized estimating equations for Poisson distributions

given that our dependent variables were all count data.

Moreover, given the nested nature of our data, generalized

estimating equations were used to account for the nested

structure of our data—individuals nested within counties

(Hubbard et al. 2010). Such a strategy allowed us to

examine community level and individual level associations

within a single analysis. An exchangeable covariance

structure was used with robust estimates. Separate equa-

tions were conducted for each dependent variable (i.e., IPV

victimization, IPV perpetration, and IPV bystander inter-

vention). In each set of models, we examined the moder-

ating role of gender in order to determine if the influence of

community-level poverty and collective efficacy on IPV

outcome variables were similar or different for men and

women. Thus, each model included the main effects of

participant gender, participant income status, county-level

poverty, collective efficacy, and the interactions between

gender and county-level poverty and gender and collective

efficacy. Non-significant interaction terms were excluded

and the models were re-estimated. Findings from the

generalized estimating equations are shown in Tables 3, 4,

5 and summarized below.

IPV Perpetration

In the model predicting IPV perpetration, after controlling

for individual-level income status, community-level

poverty was positively associated with IPV perpetration for

both men and women. Stated another way, at equivalent

individual-level income status, young adults living in more

Table 1 Means and standard deviations of variables of interest

Women Men t valuea

Mean SD Range Mean SD Range

IPV perpetration 1.99 6.42 0–44 3.52 16.06 0–93 0.88

IPV victimization 2.45 8.07 0–54 4.83 22.43 0–162 1.00

IPV Bystander 3.46 2.37 0–7 2.79 2.40 0–7 1.67

Collective Efficacy 7.93 3.93 0–15 8.28 2.63 2–15 0.60

a No significant gender differences on IPV victimization, IPV perpetration, or collective efficacy; however, marginally significant effect for IPV

bystander intervention (p = 0.097)

Table 2 Past year incidence rates of IPV perpetration and

victimization

Women Men Chi

squarea

Any

(%)

None

(%)

Any

(%)

None

(%)

IPV

perpetration

23.9 76.1 20.4 79.6 0.26

IPV

victimization

23.4 76.6 31.5 68.5 1.22

a No significant differences in IPV rates between men and women

Table 3 Generalized estimating equation parameter estimates for

IPV perpetration

B SE OR 95 % CI

Gender 0.49 0.49 1.63 0.70–3.75

Income -0.47 0.43 0.63 0.26–1.49

Community-level poverty 0.07* \.01 1.078 1.06–1.10

Collective efficacy -.64* 0.07 0.53 0.46–0.60

Gender 9 collective efficacy 0.71* 0.14 2.04 1.54–2.69

Women 0.05 0.11 1.05 0.85–1.31

Men -0.64* 0.05 0.53 0.48–0.59

* p \ 0.001

Table 4 Generalized estimating equation parameter estimates for

IPV victimization

B SE OR 95 % CI

Gender -0.01 0.20 1.00 0.68–1.46

Income 0.09 0.52 1.09 0.40–3.02

Community-level poverty 0.12* 0.02 1.13 1.10–1.16

Collective efficacy -.37* 0.04 0.69 0.64–0.75

Gender 9 collective efficacy 0.45* 0.10 1.58 1.30–1.91

Women 0.06 0.11 1.07 0.86–1.30

Men -0.37* 0.06 0.70 0.62–0.78

* p \ 0.001

Table 5 Generalized estimating equation parameter estimates for

IPV bystander intervention

B SE OR 95 % CI

Gender 0.19 0.14 1.21 0.93–1.59

Income -0.39* 0.14 0.68 0.52–0.90

Community-level poverty 0.01 \.01 1.00 1.00–1.01

Collective efficacy 0.04* 0.02 1.04 1.01–1.07

* p \ 0.01

202 Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207

123

impoverished rural communities reported higher IPV per-

petration frequencies than young adults living in less

impoverished rural communities. Whereas community-

level poverty positively predicted IPV perpetration for both

young men and women, collective efficacy was negatively

predictive of IPV perpetration for young men and unrelated

to IPV perpetration for young women. This means that for

young men, as collective efficacy increased, frequencies of

IPV perpetration decreased. Conversely, frequencies of

IPV perpetration for women were unaffected by collective

efficacy.

IPV Victimization

In the model predicting IPV victimization, after controlling

for individual-level income status, community-level pov-

erty was positively associated with IPV victimization for

both men and women. Stated another way, at equivalent

individual-level income levels, young adults living in more

impoverished rural communities reported higher IPV vic-

timization frequencies than young adults living in less

impoverished rural communities. Whereas community-

level poverty positively predicted IPV victimization for

both young men and women, collective efficacy was pre-

dictive negatively of IPV victimization for young men and

unrelated to IPV victimization for young women. This

means that for young men, as collective efficacy increased,

frequencies of IPV victimization decreased. Conversely,

frequencies of IPV victimization for women were unaf-

fected by collective efficacy.

IPV Bystander Intervention

In the model predicting IPV bystander intervention, after

controlling for individual-level income status, community-

level poverty was unrelated to IPV bystander intervention

for both men and women. Interestingly, however, higher

and moderate income individuals were less likely to report

IPV bystander intervention than lower income individuals.

Furthermore, for both men and women, collective efficacy

was positively predictive of IPV bystander intervention.

This means that for young men and women, as collective

efficacy increased, frequencies of IPV bystander interven-

tion increased.

Discussion

Grounded in social disorganization theory, the current

study examined the extent to which community-level

poverty rates and collective efficacy influenced individual

reports of IPV perpetration, victimization, and bystander

intervention among a sample of young men and women

living in rural counties across the eastern US. Although not

a primary aim of the study, it is important to comment on

the high rates of IPV documented; specifically between

one-fifth and one-third of young adults reported IPV vic-

timization and/or perpetration. Moreover, results showed

that over half of the IPV experienced was mutual, meaning

that participants were most likely to report both IPV vic-

timization and perpetration experiences as opposed to only

IPV victimization or IPV perpetration experiences. These

findings are consistent with previous studies that have

assessed rates of overall IPV and mutual IPV among young

adults (e.g., Melander et al. 2010; Straus 2007). It should

be noted, however, that the current study reflects only self-

reported prevalence. Other studies that take into account

additional variables such as motivation for use of violence

and consequences, such as injury and fear, often find

gender differences in patterns of IPV (see Dardis et al.

2014 for a review). Although these variables could not be

examined in the current study due to survey length con-

cerns, it will be important for future IPV research with

rural individuals to consider these contextual factors. On

the positive side, in the current study, both men and women

reported moderate to high levels of IPV helping behaviors.

This finding is counter to work by DeKeseredy and Sch-

wartz (2009) who found that most rural victims of post-

relationship termination sexual assault did not feel helped

by their community members. However, the finding of the

current study coincides with the broader research on

helping, which finds levels of helping to be much greater in

rural communities than urban ones (see Banyard 2011 for a

review).

Consistent with social disorganization theory, commu-

nity-level poverty predicted IPV victimization and IPV

perpetration for both men and women. Put another way,

individuals with the same family income status in different

communities demonstrated different risk for IPV with those

living in more impoverished, rural communities at greater

risk for IPV than those living in less impoverished, rural

communities. Although not directly tested in the current

study, it is important to consider some of the potential

mechanisms that may place individuals in impoverished

communities at increased risk for IPV. These mechanisms

include: (1) community-level poverty increasing stress and

maladaptive coping (e.g., drug and alcohol use) among

couples, which increases risk for IPV; (2) distrust in and

cynicism towards the justice system, which may decrease

the likelihood that victims will seek help for IPV and thus

increase risk for re-victimization; (3) lack of resources to

put towards IPV prevention and intervention efforts; (4)

community-level disadvantage hindering the creation of

social ties among residents, increasing vulnerability to IPV;

and (5) IPV increasing social isolation among community

residents, preventing the spread of community values and

Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207 203

123

norms that disapprove of IPV (Plass 1993; Pinchevsky and

Wright 2012; Ross and Mirowsky 2009; Sampson and

Bartusch 1998). It will be important for future research to

include methodologies that allow for the measurement of

these hypothesized mediators in order to provide a more

nuanced understanding of how and why community-level

poverty impacts individual-level reports of IPV victimiza-

tion and perpetration.

In addition to community-level poverty, collective effi-

cacy also significantly and positively predicted IPV vic-

timization and perpetration for men. Collective efficacy,

however, was unrelated to IPV victimization and perpe-

tration for women. Although not fully consistent with

social disorganization theory and our hypotheses, the cur-

rent study’s findings are consistent with Jain et al.’s (2010)

study of urban adolescence in which collective efficacy

was a protective factor for boys’ perpetration of IPV, but

unrelated to girls’ perpetration of IPV. Some research

suggests that individual and relational variables (e.g.,

concerns for preserving relationships) may be more salient

for girls and women’s perpetration of IPV, whereas peer-

group and social context (e.g., abusive peers, peers who

support IPV) may be more salient for boys and men’s

perpetration of IPV (Dardis et al. 2014; Jain et al. 2010;

Lewis and Fremouw 2001; Miller and White 2004; Wil-

liamson and Silverman 2001). Thus, it is possible that

social cohesion among community members, especially in

communities disapproving of violence, may serve as a

protective factor against young men’s experiences with

IPV, but that for women social cohesion is not a salient

factor in predicting IPV victimization and perpetration

occurrences. It is important to keep in mind that in our

study we only measured IPV occurrences and not the

context or outcomes associated with IPV where collective

efficacy is likely important to consider for girls and women

as well as boys and men. For example, whereas collective

efficacy may not predict young women’s experiences with

IPV victimization, we would expect that among female

victims of IPV, as well as male victims, collective efficacy

would predict help-seeking (Pinchevsky and Wright 2012).

Clearly more research is needed to replicate the current

study’s findings and better understand the complex rela-

tionships among collective efficacy, IPV experiences, and

gender.

Although collective efficacy was related to IPV vic-

timization and perpetration only for young men, collective

efficacy was related to IPV bystander intervention for both

young men and women. Some researchers have argued that

collective efficacy may operate to prevent some types of

crime such as vandalism and burglary, but not other types

of crimes that are considered private such as IPV (DeKe-

seredy and Schwartz 2009; Frye et al. 2008). However, the

current study’s findings are not consistent with these

assertions. Our findings are consistent with studies on

college campuses that found that greater sense of com-

munity was linked to greater bystander actions in sexual

assault situations (Banyard 2008) and that greater sense of

trust in campus authorities was associated with greater

intent to report instances of known violence (Sulkowski

2011). Indeed, the broader helping literature (Knafo et al.

2009) documents cross cultural differences in helping. This

work suggests that context will make a difference in

bystander action. To date, however, little work has been

done to examine contextual factors for bystanders to IPV.

In one of the few studies on this topic, Frye et al. (2008) did

not find that neighborhood characteristics were predictive

of helping related to IPV in an urban adult sample. It is

possible that collective efficacy may operate differently for

young adults where privacy norms and traditional values

may not be as salient as for older adults, and for whom

developmentally peer norms are very salient. Thus we

might expect young adults’ feelings of connectedness with

their communities to increase IPV bystander and helping

behaviors.

There are likely other important variables that would

enhance our understanding of the relationships between

collective efficacy and IPV that we did not include in our

study. For example, community norms regarding IPV could

moderate the relationship between collective efficacy and

IPV bystander intervention such that in communities

highly accepting of IPV there may be a negative relation-

ship between collective efficacy and IPV bystander inter-

vention, whereas in communities highly disapproving of

IPV there may be a positive relationship between collective

efficacy and IPV bystander intervention. Moreover, there

may be differences in how collective efficacy and IPV

bystander intervention operate depending on the type (e.g.,

physical versus sexual), severity (e.g., moderate mutual

IPV opposed to severe intimate partner terrorism), and

other characteristics of the IPV experienced and in terms of

whether the person to be helped is a friend or stranger. It

will be important for future research to include methodol-

ogies that will allow for a more nuanced understanding of

how collective efficacy operates similarly and differently

within and across communities regarding IPV bystander

intervention. Qualitative research may be especially

important in better understanding and untangling these

relationships.

In addition to collective efficacy, individual-level

income status also predicted bystander intervention for

both young men and women such that individuals with

higher and moderate income status reported less IPV

bystander intervention than individuals with lower

incomes; community-level poverty was unrelated to IPV

bystander intervention. It may be that individuals with

higher or moderate incomes may perceive that they have

204 Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207

123

more to lose in terms of their reputation and prestige in the

community by helping and associating with people expe-

riencing IPV, which is often misperceived as being a

stigmatized social problem affecting lower class individu-

als (Domestic Violence Action Center 2012). This concern

may be especially pronounced in rural communities where

‘‘everyone knows everyone’s business’’ and thus helping

individuals in situations of IPV is likely to be known by

others in the community.

Although the current data add to our understanding of

how community-level poverty and collective efficacy

impact IPV among young adults in rural communities,

several limitations should be noted. The most notable limi-

tation is the small sample size both in terms of participants

and rural counties. Although the findings should be con-

sidered with caution in light of the small sample sizes, it is

promising that the findings of the current study largely align

with previous research and theory. Nevertheless, future

research is needed that includes larger samples sizes at both

the participant and community and county levels. Moreover,

the current study was limited by the lack of racial and ethnic

diversity, which is present in some rural communities. Thus,

a national study that aims to stratify rural samples across

different demographics and geographic regions is sorely

needed. We also had generally low response rates from the

most impoverished communities, which suggests that there

may need to be multiple recruitment methods (e.g., online,

mailed paper and pencil survey, telephone survey) tailored

to specific community needs and resources. As has been

noted by other researchers (e.g., Pierce and Scherra 2004),

there are many unique barriers to conducting research with

individuals living in rural communities and more attention is

needed to develop best practices for conducting research,

especially sensitive research with potential safety concerns

such as IPV, with rural communities.

Additional limitations of the current study include our

lack of inclusion of potential mediators and moderators

(previously discussed) in the relationships among com-

munity-level poverty, collective efficacy, and IPV victim-

ization, perpetration, and bystander intervention. We also

did not include a comprehensive assessment of commu-

nity-level variables that theoretically we would expect to

be related to individual-level experiences of IPV. For

example, the extent to which communities are addressing

IPV through programming, policies and other initiatives is

likely related to the incidence of IPV victimization, per-

petration, and bystander intervention as well as the extent

to which victims of IPV engage in help-seeking behaviors.

Thus, future research is sorely needed to better examine the

extent to which a number of theoretically relevant vari-

ables, such as community readiness to address IPV, impact

various individual-level aspects related to IPV. Another

limitation of the current study was that it was cross-

sectional. Future research would benefit from the inclusion

of longitudinal designs that would allow for the examina-

tion of how community-level factors impact IPV outcome

variables over time. Finally, the vast majority of the

research literature on IPV, including IPV in rural com-

munities, has utilized quantitative methodologies. Future

research would benefit from the inclusion of qualitative

methodologies which may be especially useful in under-

standing how and why community-level factors operate in

relation to IPV from the lived experiences of rural com-

munity residents.

Despite these limitations, the study has implications for

practice and policy. To date, IPV prevention programming

(e.g., Safe Dates, Foshee et al. 1998) focuses only on

individual and relational risk and protective factors.

However, the current study suggests that prevention pro-

gramming may benefit from extending beyond these inner-

most realms of the social ecological model. Multi-level

IPV intervention and prevention programming that takes

into account structural economic indicators and community

compositional factors may be most effective in helping to

prevent IPV in our communities. However, first it is

important to better understand the explanatory mechanisms

(e.g., lack of jobs for young adults, lack of community

readiness addressing IPV, lack of activities in rural com-

munities that lead to high risk behaviors such as substance

use that increase risk for IPV, or a combination of these

factors or others) underlying the relationship between

community-level poverty and IPV so that multi-level pro-

gramming can be most appropriately and effectively tai-

lored. Along these lines, Jain et al. (2010) also suggested

that community-capacity building efforts should be

expanded to include measurement and prevention strate-

gies of IPV among adolescents and young adults. More-

over, in light of the protective effect of collective efficacy

on IPV, it may be important for community-based pro-

gramming to include efforts to increase collective efficacy.

Although this has not yet been done specific to IPV pre-

vention, there are existing programs for enhancing collec-

tive efficacy that have been developed for other individuals

and communities (e.g., depression in African American

communities: Chung et al. 2009; academic achievement in

classroom communities: Brinson and Stein 2007).

Taken together, the findings in this paper highlight the

need to better understand the community context in the

landscape of IPV victimization, perpetration, and bystander

behavior. This may be especially critical in rural places

where people are often more aware of their neighbors’

business. Further research is needed to tease this out both

across and within place types. Additionally, it would be

valuable for future studies to explore additional charac-

teristics of communities and their relationship to IPV

behaviors among young adults.

Am J Community Psychol (2014) 53:198–207 205

123

Acknowledgments Funding for this project was provided by the

University of New Hampshire’s College of Liberal Arts Dean’s Office

and the Department of Psychology, as well as the Annie E. Casey

Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg foundation, and anonymous donors.

We would like to thank all of the young adults who participated in

this study. We would also like to thank Kateryna Sylaska, Kayleigh

Greaney, Ryan Hebert, Valerie Gauthier, Samantha Harkey, Hannah

Feintuch, Kasey Lynch, Jordan Strand, and Jennifer Clayton for their

assistance with participant recruitment efforts and data management

as well as the many individuals, agencies, organizations, and busi-

nesses that assisted us in recruiting participants for this study. Finally,

we would like to express appreciation to Matthew Price and Mac-

kenzie Harms for their assistance with data analyses.

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