The 1975 National Family Violence Survey explores conflict/resolution and violence in the family. The family is usually thought of as a harmonious group. In general, sociologists and other social scientists think of physical violence in the family as occurring infrequently, and when it does occur, as being abnormal or dysfunctional. Straus, et. al. disagree, and have designed the 1975 National Family Violence survey to show that physical violence between family members is more frequent than believed. There are a total of 2,143 cases and 807 variables included in the study. Topics in the study include: demographics (household characteristics/composition, race, income, religion, education, etc.); marital/divorce history; marital behavior (conflict/violence and resolution); employment (history, status); and satisfaction/attitudes about various aspects of life.

Interviews were conducted among households in which at least one couple resided using a national probability sampling technique. The research itself had three main objectives: