Adding Insult to Injury: Development and Initial Validation ofthe Partner-Directed Insults Scale

I present the development and initial validation of a new measure designed to
assess the specific content of insults used by men against their intimate partners. I used
feedback from battered women, along with a review of the relevant literature, to identify
specific insults for inclusion in the Partner-Directed Insults Scale (PDIS) (Preliminary
Study). I administered the PDIS to a sample of United States participants (Study 1) and a
sample of New Zealand participants (Study 2), allowing for a cross-national investigation
of the specific insults that men use to derogate their partners. The results demonstrate the
practical need for such a scale and provide evidence for the discriminant validity of the
PDIS by documenting that men's use of insults predicts their use of controlling behaviors
and physical violence. It is this predictive utility that makes the PDIS a valuable tool for
researchers and clinicians alike.