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Abstract: 

For years battered women’s advocates and many batterer treatment providers have believed that men who batter are narcissistic, egotistic, self-entitled, and have a grandiose sense of their superiority. Yet, the psychological literature has always maintained that these men suffer from low self-esteem and low assertiveness, typically using data from court referral programs (whether diversion or post conviction) where low self-esteem could simply reflect that the men were “caught” and disciplined. Regardless of why, virtually all treatment programs (as opposed to many batterer education programs) focus on helping batterers feel better about themselves and learn to be more assertive.

Keywords: narcissism is the key to battering; Roy F. Baumeister, “Violent Pride: Do People Turn Violent Because of Self-Hate, or Self-Love?”; alcohol use not significant predictor; Pam Wilson, Judith McFarlane, Ann Malecha, Kathy Watson, Dorothy Lemmy, Pam

Affiliations:  1: Editor, Domestic Violence Report.