Emily M. Douglas is a public policy scientist conducting research on child and family well-being, the child welfare system, fatal child maltreatment, domestic violence and divorced families, and corporal punishment. She is professor and head of the Department of Social Science and Policy Studies at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Douglas has done extensive studies on child abuse leading to death and she has developed recommendation for social workers to better identify children at risk. Douglas has also studied the difficulty of distinguishing fatal child maltreatment from sudden infant death syndrome.
Corporal punishment
In an international research investigation that used an ecological study design, Douglas compared the rate of dating violence among university students in different countries and its relationship to receiving corporal punishment. She found that the rate of dating violence and injury was higher in the universities where more students had experienced corporal punishment as a child.
Male victims
Together with Denise Hines, Douglas has published a series of papers on male victims of domestic violence, including its prevalence and severity,, and men's post-violence helpseeking behavior and experiences.
Methods
With Murray A. Straus, Douglas has developed a widely used short form questionnaire to evaluate intimate partner violence. To be used in time limited situation, it is based on the longer Conflict Tactics Scales, the most commonly used survey instrument for domestic violence.
Selected publications
Books
Douglas EM. Mending broken families: Social policies for divorced families:Are they working? Lanham, MD:Roman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006.
Douglas EM. Innovations in Child & Family Policy: Multidisciplinary Research and Perspectives on Strengthening Children and Their Families. Lanham, MD:Lexington Books, 2010.
Straus MA, Douglas EM, Medeiros RA. The primordial violence: Corporal punishment by parents, cognitive development, and crime. New York: Routledge/Taylor & Francis, 2013.
Douglas EM. Child maltreatment fatalities in the United States: Four decades of policy, program, and professional responses. Springer, 2016.
Scientific articles
Straus MA, Douglas EM. A short form of the Revised Conflict Tactics Scales, and typologies for severity and mutuality. Violence and victims. 2004;19:507-20.
Douglas EM. Familial violence socialization in childhood and later life approval of corporal punishment: A cross–cultural perspective. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry. 2006 Jan;76:23–30.
Hines DA, Douglas EM. Women's use of intimate partner violence against men: Prevalence, implications, and consequences. Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma. 2009 Aug 19;18:572-86.
Hines DA, Douglas EM. A closer look at men who sustain intimate terrorism by women. Partner Abuse. 2010 Jan 1;1:286.
Hines D, Douglas E. Intimate terrorism by women towards men: does it exist?. Journal of aggression, conflict and peace research. 2010 Jul 6;2:36–56.
Douglas EM, Hines DA. The helpseeking experiences of men who sustain intimate partner violence: An overlooked population and implications for practice. Journal of family violence. 2011 Aug 1;26:473-85.
Hines DA, Douglas EM. Sexual aggression experiences among male victims of physical partner violence: Prevalence, severity, and health correlates for male victims and their children. Archives of sexual behavior, 45:1133–1151, 2016.
Douglas EM, Gushwa MK. An Exploratory Analysis of Seven Child Welfare Workers who Confused SIDS with Child Maltreatment Fatalities: A Brief Research Report. Journal of Social Service Research, 2019.
