Teen dating violence is down, but boys still report more violence than girls Science, Health & Technology
When it comes to teen dating violence, boys are more likely to report being the victim of violence—being hit, slapped, or pushed—than girls. That’s the surprising finding of new research from the University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University.
Overall, fewer teens are reporting experiencing physical abuse from their dating partners, with five per cent of teens reporting dating violence in 2013, down from six per cent in 2003.
However, the researchers found 5.8 per cent of boys and 4.2 per cent of girls said they had experienced dating violence in the past year.
First author Catherine Shaffer, a PhD student from SFU who was involved in the study, says more research is needed to understand why boys are reporting more dating violence.
“It could be that it’s still socially acceptable for girls to hit or slap boys in dating relationships,” she said. “This has been found in studies of adolescents in other countries as well.”
She added that the overall decline in dating violence, while small, is encouraging.
“Young people who experience dating violence are more likely to act out and take unnecessary risks, and they’re also more likely to experience depression or think about or attempt suicide,” Shaffer said. “That’s why it’s good to see that decline in dating violence over a 10-year span. It suggests that healthy relationship programs are making an impact among youth.”
The study is the first in Canada to look at dating violence trends among adolescents over time, and the first in North America to compare trends for boys and girls. Researchers analyzed data from three B.C. Adolescent Health Surveys involving 35,900 youth in grade 7 to 12 who were in dating relationships.
Elizabeth Saewyc, senior study author and UBC nursing professor, said the findings highlight the need for more support programs for both boys and girls in dating relationships.
“A lot of our interventions assume that the girl is always the victim, but these findings tell us that it isn’t always so,” said Saewyc. “And relationship violence, be it physical, sexual or other forms, and regardless who the perpetrator is, is never OK. Health-care providers, parents and caregivers, schools and others can protect teens from dating violence by helping them define what healthy relationships looks like, even before their first date.”
The study analyzed surveys conducted by the McCreary Centre Society, a community-based organization dedicated to adolescent health research in B.C. Results were published recently in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence.
bobbyfiend on August 30th, 2018 at 05:14 UTC »
This has been a consistent finding (more or less) since the 80s, though it was difficult to get an audience for it, for some fairly obvious reasons. David Finkelhor, I think, was one of the first researchers to start talking about this effect in his surveys.
If the trends in this study are as they have been in other research, then boys/men are marginally more likely to report being the victim of aggression/violence from a significant other, but girls/women are more likely to suffer serious injuries. And because of social stigma (mainly) and cultural norms, boys/men are far less likely to report the abuse. Fewer of them are being seriously physically harmed, but many are, and it's a problem.
fitzroy95 on August 30th, 2018 at 03:38 UTC »
Good to see that research is covering violence from both sides of the aisle, because this extends into adult relationships as well. And while this looks mainly at the incidence of violence (how often it happens), it would be good to see a follow up look at the severity of the violence, as a slap vs a solid punch can leave quite different results.
mvea on August 30th, 2018 at 03:34 UTC »
The title of the post is a copy and paste from the title and first paragraph of the linked academic press release here :
Journal Reference:
Ten-Year Trends in Physical Dating Violence Victimization Among Adolescent Boys and Girls in British Columbia, Canada
Catherine S. Shaffer, MA, Jones Adjei, PhD, Jodi L. Viljoen, PhD, Kevin S. Douglas, LLB, PhD, Elizabeth M. Saewyc, PhD, RN, FSAHM, FCAHS, FAAN
Journal of Interpersonal Violence 2018
https://doi.org/10.1177/0886260518788367
Link: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0886260518788367
Abstract
Physical dating violence (PDV) victimization among adolescents is a serious global problem. Although knowledge of trends in PDV victimization can help guide programming and health policies, little research has examined whether the prevalence of PDV victimization has increased, decreased, or remained stable over time among non-U.S.-based samples of youth. In addition, few studies have directly tested whether disparities in PDV victimization between boys and girls have narrowed, widened, or remained unchanged in recent years. To address these gaps, we used school-based data from the British Columbia Adolescent Health Survey (BC AHS) of 2003, 2008, and 2013 (n boys = 18,441 and n girls = 17,459) to examine 10-year trends in PDV victimization. We also tested whether trends differed across self-reported sex. Data from the 2003 to 2013 BC AHS revealed that recent PDV victimization rates had significantly decreased among youth overall (5.9%-5.0%) and boys (8.0%-5.8%), but not girls (5.3%-4.2%). Although boys had steeper declines than girls in PDV victimization rates, year-by-sex interactions indicate that the sex gap in PDV victimization had not significantly narrowed. Moreover, rates of PDV victimization over the 10-year period indicated significantly higher rates of PDV victimization among boys compared with girls. Despite positive declines in recent rates of PDV victimization among youth, important differences in rates of PDV victimization between boys and girls remain. These findings underscore the need for greater attention to sex differences in research and programming and health policies to reduce PDV victimization and the sex disparities therein.