Characteristics and Prevalence of Adult Children Violence against Parents in Slovenia

Abstract

This paper focuses on the characteristics and causes of violence committed by adult children against their parents. The aim is to identify how common these crimes are in Slovenia, which forms of violence are dominant, and what has been the trend in this field in the period 2010 to 2020. We analysed the statistics obtained by the Slovenian Police, including the following criminal offences where perpetrator and victim were in an adult child-parent relationship: manslaughter, murder, actual bodily harm, aggravated bodily harm, grievous bodily harm, sexual abuse of a defenceless person and family violence. Furthermore, we present the share of these acts compared to all such crimes in a specific year. The factors that can contribute to violence against parents by adult children are related to their mental state, their addiction to alcohol or illicit drugs, financial dependence on the parent, abuse of the perpetrator as a child by the parent, and health condition of the parent, and along with this the (un)related stress of the perpetrator and victim. The results of analyses show that such cases are relatively rare in relation to all crimes. The most common crime dealt with in this context was cases of family violence (11%), followed by actual and aggravated bodily harm, and the lowest number of cases was for those related to sexual abuse of defenceless persons and grievous bodily harm (2%). The share of cases of violence against parents in relation to all crimes (excluding sexual abuse of a defenceless person) ranges between 4% and 7% per year. The authors conclude that despite the relatively small number of such cases, the topic is important for our ageing societies, in which the population of older people will increase in the future.