Perpetrators and Family Characteristics In the Co-Occurrence of Child Maltreatment and Domestic Violence

Background and Objectives

Research on the overlap between domestic violence and child maltreatment has primarily focused on children, with less attention to perpetrator and family-level characteristics. This study aims to answer the following research question: What are the differences in perpetrator and family characteristics between substantiated child maltreatment reports with and without domestic violence indication?

Methods

We used the 2022 child maltreatment hotline report data (NCANDS Child File) and converted the data into separate report-level and perpetrator-level datasets. We included only substantiated reports following investigation (for which perpetrator information was available). We followed Ahn et al. (2025) and Lee et al. (2026) and selected 13 states that met the following criteria: (1) domestic violence indication (FCViol) greater than 10% and (2) less than 30% missing data in living arrangement (ChLvng). The final sample included 108,226 reports with 136,159 perpetrators. Descriptive analyses, including chi-square and t-test analyses, were conducted to assess differences in case characteristics between those with and without indicated domestic violence.

Results

Reports with identified domestic violence were more likely to involve multiple perpetrators, including multiple caregivers listed as perpetrators. Mothers were less likely to be involved in these reports, whereas fathers were more likely to be involved. Children tended to be considerably younger. Reports involving two-parent families were more likely to include a domestic violence indication than those involving one-parent families or other care settings.

Reports with domestic violence indication were several times more likely to include substantiated emotional or “other” types of abuse (i.e., those not classified as physical abuse, sexual abuse, or neglect), and much less likely to include sexual abuse. Among reports with two or more perpetrators, reports with domestic violence indication were more likely to assign different maltreatment types to different perpetrators.

When we examined individual perpetrators rather than reports, we found a higher proportion of male perpetrators in cases with domestic violence. These cases also included more parents (relative to other types of caregivers). Overall, the patterns observed in the report-level analyses were consistent at the perpetrator level, with emotional and “other” types of maltreatment more common in reports with domestic violence indication.

Conclusions and Implications

Several notable differences were found between reports with and without domestic violence. The high proportion of emotional and “other” maltreatment types among reports with identified domestic violence highlights the lack of a specific category for these safety concerns. Given the variation in how states and CPS agencies handle cases involving domestic violence, introducing a separate category may support more consistent and accurate data collection.

Notably, children in reports with identified domestic violence tended to be younger. It is unclear whether this reflects a higher occurrence of domestic violence in families with younger children, or greater concern among reporters and investigators when younger children are present in the home.