Gender and Sexuality in Childhood Emotional Abuse: An Exploration of Victim-survivor Experiences in Australia
Date
2026
Authors
Moulding, N.
McLinton, S.
Borgkvist, A.
Tseris, E.
Buchanan, F.
Fawcett, B.
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Journal article
Citation
Journal of Family Violence, 2026; 1-19
Statement of Responsibility
Nicole Moulding, Sarven McLinton, Ashlee Borgkvist, Emma Tseris, Fiona Buchanan, Barbara Fawcett
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Abstract
Purpose: This article reports on a research project that aimed to generate new knowledge about the social dimensions of childhood emotional abuse. The driving research question for the overarching study asked how social context shapes and structures childhood emotional abuse, with the two sub-questions specifically relevant to this paper asking how the severity of childhood emotional abuse might vary according to the gender and sexual identity of victim-survivors, and how gender power relations frame these abusive practices. Methods: The study used a mixed method involving a national quantitative and qualitative survey (N = 472), and qualitative in-depth interviews and narrative-discursive analysis (N = 31). Results: Quantitative analysis revealed that cisgender heterosexual women, and people of diverse genders and sexualities, report significantly higher frequencies of certain types of gendered childhood emotional abuse compared to cisgender heterosexual men. Qualitative analysis revealed the heteronormative gender discourses driving these abusive practices. Conclusions: Some forms of childhood emotional abuse can be understood as rather brutal forms of gendering within families, which might help to explain existing evidence that women and individuals who are gender and sexually diverse experience higher levels of distress down track than cisgender heterosexual men.
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©The author(s). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/