The Effect of a Male Surplus on Intimate Partner Violence in India

Theories of the social consequences of imbalanced sex ratios posit that men will exercise strict control over women's behaviour when women's relationship options are plentiful and men's own options are limited. Using data from the third National Family and Health Survey, this paper investigates the effect of the community sex ratio on women's experience of intimate partner violence in India. Multilevel logistic regression models show that a relative surplus of men in a community increases the likelihood of physical abuse by husbands even after adjusting for various other individual, household, and geographic characteristics. Further evidence of control over women when there is a sex ratio imbalance is provided by the increased odds of husbands distrusting wives with money.