The participants were recruited from the community via radio announcements and flyers requesting married couples for a study of couple interactions. They received monetary compensation for their participation. Each participant completed a set of self-report instruments and provided demographic information. Eighty-eight percent of the women reported receiving verbal aggression from their husband during the past year, and 18 percent reported physical aggression. Verbal and physical victimization had significant negative direct effects on women's marital satisfaction; victimized women were characterized by less satisfaction and less stability regardless of their sense of relationship efficacy or their perceptions of spousal support. However, the effects of victimization on women's depression were moderated by relationship efficacy, perceived intimacy, and acceptance of emotional expression provided by the spouse. Thus, nonvictimized women who perceived more support and felt more efficacious, relative to those who felt less support and less efficacy, experienced fewer depressive symptoms. In contrast, victimized women who perceived more support and felt more efficacious in their relationships, relative to those characterized by less support and less efficacy, experienced more depressive symptoms. In the context of marital violence, increasing levels of relationship efficacy and perceptions of spouse support may be accompanied by an increase in the risk for depressive reactions. Tables and 50 references (Author abstract modified)