Borderline Personality Traits and Intimate Partner Aggression: An International Multisite, Cross-Gender Analysis

Abstract

Although research has consistently shown that men and women use intimate partner aggression (IPA) at approximately equal rates, there is little empirical research on whether the predictors of IPA are the same for men and women. The current study investigated whether borderline personality (BP) differentially predicted the use of IPA for men and women across 67 university sites from around the world. Results showed that BP predicted several forms of IPA and that gender did not moderate the association between IPA and BP. Although the strength of the association between IPA and BP significantly differed across sites, it was in the predicted direction for the overwhelming majority of sites. Implications of these results and suggestions for future research are discussed.