Studies have shown that youths who experience cyber dating abuse are also more likely to experience physical, psychological, and sexual dating violence. One study found a statistically significant association between cyber dating abuse and experiencing physical or sexual ARA (Dick et al., 2014). These rates of victimization were statistically significantly higher, compared with teens who reported no cyber dating abuse victimization.
Further, higher levels of parental monitoring are also protective against later experiences of teen dating violence (East and Hokoda, 2015; Reppucci et al., 2013). High levels of parental strictness and conservative sexual attitudes also decreased the likelihood of adolescent victimization . One study examined risk and protective factors related to teen dating violence among 223 at-risk adolescents, ages 13 to 18 (Reppucci et al., 2013) and showed similar findings. Results showed that boys and girls were equally likely to report experiencing physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. However, girls were more likely to report perpetrating both physical and emotional violence, and boys were more likely to report perpetrating sexual violence.
Overall, there is limited research on protective factors for teen dating violence (East and Hokoda, 2015; Vagi et al., 2013). With regard to sexual orientation, 7.2 percent of heterosexual students; 13.1 percent of gay, lesbian, and bisexual students; and 16.9 percent of questioning students reported experiencing physical dating violence. Female students were more likely to report having experienced physical dating violence victimization than male students (9.3 percent versus 7.0 percent, respectively). More generally, intimate-partner violence is defined as physical, sexual, or psychological harm by a current or former intimate partner . Intimate-partner violence has historically been called “domestic violence” and can occur among both heterosexual and same-sex couples.
Although there are methodological problems accurately determining prevalence rates, a conservative estimate is that one in three adolescents has experienced physical or sexual violence in a dating relationship (Avery-Leaf, Cascardi, O’Leary, & Cano, 1997). Teen dating violence appears to parallel violence in adult relationships in that it exists on a continuum ranging from verbal abuse to rape and murder . Teen victims may be especially vulnerable due to their inexperience in dating relationships, their susceptibility to peer pressure and their reluctance to tell an adult about the abuse . Further, many adolescents have difficulty recognizing physical and sexual abuse as such and may perceive controlling and jealous behaviors as signs of love .
For most of the females who were exposed to domestic violence, their husbands acted as the perpetrators (72.73%) and they reported slapping as the specific act of physical assault (72.73%). The study concluded that the need for justified female empowerment and this calls for a multidisciplinary approach to develop public health measures, which would most effectively address the problem of domestic violence. Many programs have been developed to target both teen dating violence perpetration and victimization. Looked closely into protective factors for teen dating violence; the study authors looked at outcomes that combined measures of perpetration and victimization together .
In one study of stalking and harassment, the authors found that adolescents living in communities with higher-than-average violence crime rates were more likely to become perpetrators of stalking and harassment, but they were not more likely to be victims (Rothman et al., 2021). Research has found that many youths who are victims of teen dating violence also perpetrate . For example, the STRiV study found that 58 percent of youths reported both victimization and perpetration of ARA. Only 11 percent reported only ARA victimization, and 4.7 percent reported only ARA perpetration. This overlap was observed for physical and psychological ARA, but less so for sexual ARA. Another study used data from theNational Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence to explore the co-occurrence of physical teen dating violence victimization with other forms of victimization.
Similarly, our review of what is known about risk factors reveals inconsistency among studies. We assess published evaluations of adolescent dating violence prevention programs and discuss their findings and limitations. Finally, we discuss challenges to researchers in this area and suggest that additional investment in high-quality basic research is needed to inform the development of sound theory and effective prevention and intervention programs. Finally, a 2020 qualitative study by Blackburn and colleagues focused on reasons why 75 adolescent girls, ages 15 to 19, with histories of dating violence perpetration intended to stop perpetrating teen dating violence. However, to date, there have been no other studies aimed at investigating the motives for adolescents to stop perpetrating dating abuse (Levesque et al., 2016; Zalmanowitz et al., 2013).
They also found that a greater number of females than males reported cyber dating abuse victimization. In addition, a meta-analysis by Wincentak, Connolly, and Card explored rates of perpetration of physical and sexual dating violence. The results showed that 25 percent of girls and 13 percent of boys reported perpetrating physical dating violence, whereas 10 percent of boys and 3 percent of girls reported perpetrating sexual dating violence.
Prevalence and characteristics of three subtypes of dating violence among Danish seventh-grade students. A representative sample of students in the province of Quebec, Canada was used to explore teenagers’ self-efficacy to reach out for help or to help others in a situation of DV victimization and perpetration. The results at Wave 3 also showed that females who reported only psychological victimization were more likely to experience increased odds of episodic drinking and adult intimate-partner victimization, compared with females who reported no victimization. Of that group who sought help, however, 77.2 percent reported turning to a friend for aid.
Researchers found that the rate of injury for all physical teen dating violence episodes was 20 percent . Another study of 917 adolescents in grades 8–12 found that one third to one half of youths who experienced any physical and/or sexual dating violence also sustained an injury (Tharp et al., 2017). In addition, a study by Molidor and Tolman found Growlr that 4.3 percent of girls and 1.9 percent of boys needed medical attention because of a dating violence incident, but this difference was not statistically significant. In terms of short-term consequences, Silverman and colleagues explored health- and mental health–related outcomes of girls who reported physical and sexual dating violence.
They are worried that the counterpart will turn on them or that no one will care but, on a typical day, there are more than 20,000 phone calls placed to domestic violence hotlines nationwide. Though this crime is terrible, only 34% of people who are injured by intimate partners receive medical care for their injuries. The findings suggest that secondary prevention of dating violence necessitates educating clinicians on the importance of screening and training practitioners in clinical settings on how to effectively screen adolescents for dating violence, including risk factors for victimization. It is suggested that dating violence against adolescent males is sufficiently widespread and clusters with other risk factors, and that further research and intervention efforts be directed toward better understanding and preventing both male victimization and its psychosocial sequalae. There is overall mixed evidence with regard to the impact of school-based prevention programs on dating violence perpetration and victimization. A meta-analysis of seven studies also found that parental support was a protective factor against teen dating violence victimization (Spencer et al., 2020).
Other research shows that bullying is related to other forms of interpersonal aggression among youth . Adolescents may learn that bullying others in a peer relationship can improve the social status of the bully and then apply the same behavior to a romantic relationship. Overall, rates of youths reporting perpetration of physical dating violence ranged from 12 percent to 17 percent, while sexual dating violence perpetration rates ranged from 3 percent to 12 percent (Basile et al., 2020; Ybarra et al., 2016; Taylor and Mumford, 2016). Psychological dating violence was the most common type of abuse, with as many as two youths out of three reporting perpetrating psychological abuse . Females reported higher perpetration rates of physical and psychological dating violence, but males reported higher rates of sexual dating violence (Ybarra et al., 2016; Taylor and Mumford, 2016; Wincentak et al., 2017; Espelage et al., 2014).
From the research I’m wanting to perform, I am hoping to be able to analyze that there is a great need for a support system out there for people that do not report domestic violence or decide to drop the charges on the perpetrator. With this support system, I am planning to be able to answer the questions that I have and to be able to assist the victims the correct way and let them know that they have an option to turn to. Though the variables that I am concerned about is that people will still not tell about their domestic violence but once victims understand my plan for a program to assist them, I hope to be able to gain a sense of trust with them. Once the trust is established, then they will be more open to telling their experiences that will further the program to reach other to help more men and women that deal with domestic violence.
However, there were no statistically significant effects on sexual harassment/assault perpetration, peer violence/bullying perpetration, peer violence/bullying victimization, sexual activity, substance use, or prosocial attitudes. For example, a meta-analysis (Garthe et al., 2017) incorporated data from more than 4,000 adolescents to synthesize the most salient risk factors in teen dating violence. The findings showed a statistically significant correlation between peer modeling (i.e., when a youth models behavior seen in their peer) and the likelihood of an adolescent’s involvement in dating violence. The study authors proposed that adolescents may model romantic relationships after the relationships in which they have seen their peers participate.