Sitting around with the family watching football is a favored Thanksgiving tradition. But new research reveals that football spectating is not always pleasant: losses have a statistical link to a rise in domestic violence. The study, which matched 12 years worth of team records with local domestic violence rates, suggests that a painful loss can trigger moments of anger in fans, causing them to lash out. Here are some of the findings:
- When a team favored to win loses, there is an eight percent increase in intimate partner violence in the hometown state (the study only looked at states with one team).
- The increase in violence comes in the hours immediately following the loss.
- When the loss is against a traditional rival, the spike in violence doubles.
- The rate spike also doubles following losses in games with a lot of turnovers and penalties.
But don't call for a ban on football quite yet — the experts reasonably point out that emotional games might just set off violence that would otherwise happen later. So while this information enlightens us about occasions that put women at higher risk of suffering domestic violence, it doesn't exactly tell us more about how to address the root causes. What do you make of it?
Erickson Beamon
disgusting and sad. and of course I'm sure the abusers in these situations say "well such and such team lost, of course I was mad" as if its an excuse
1biggest incidence of domestic violence; super bowl sunday.
2Just because there's a correlation doesn't mean it's causal.
3I heard about this years ago. Networks wanted to run commercials discouraging domestic violence during football games. A lot of women pleaded to not have the commercials ran. They feared it would make the abuse worse.
4This is a myth it was release several years ago by the woman who was heading up NOW. Though in the past it's always been said to happen around Superbowl Sunday. But really it's just the same story on a different date. Without a doubt domestic violence does happen but it isn't caused by a football game. Men don't just suddenly become violent because their favorite team loses. Or women for that matter. Here's the fact check link to snopes.com, check it out.
5http://www.snopes.com/crime/statistics/superbowl.asp
i've heard this too. but i live in wisconsin. and packer fans are pretty hardcore/drunk.
6True, genesis, but even with correlation it's worth looking into.
7I've been trying to tell my husband that football's no good. Especially the NFL--they hire dog killers (Vick) and woman beaters (Larry Johnson).
8Well Jayde once they have satisfied the terms of their punishment, would you rather have them teaching your kids, running a day care, breaking into your home searching for money, or taking their skill set to the market place (NFL) and finding a suitable employer? I would rather have them gainfully employed in the NFL. After all, the most important component of our criminal justice system is rehabilitation.
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