CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN TELEPHONE AND WRITTEN ASSESSMENTS OF PHYSICAL VIOLENCE IN MARRIAGE

Clinic couples (N = 50) participated in a study examining the consiste ncy of reported rates of aggression via telephone and written administ rations of the Conflict Tactics Scale. Both husbands' and wives' repor ts of physical aggression were highly consistent between the telephone and written assessments. Reports of wife-to-husband aggression were s ignificantly more consistent than reports of husband-to-wife aggressio n. As expected, wives reported significantly more husband-to-wife aggr ession than their husbands reported. Generally, there were no signific ant sex differences on reports of wife-to-husband aggression. The impl ications of these findings for various studies are discussed.