Healthy Teen Relationships FAQs
What is teen dating violence?
How frequent is teen dating violence?
Who are the victims of teen dating violence?
What are additional health concerns for victims of teen dating violence?
What is teen dating violence?
Dating violence refers to a pattern of actual or threatened acts of physical, sexual and/or emotional abuse perpetrated by an adolescent against a current or former dating partner. Abuse may include insults, coercion, social sabotage, sexual harassment, threats and/or acts of physical or sexual abuse. The abusive teen uses this pattern of violent and coercive behavior, in a heterosexual or homosexual dating relationship, in order to gain power and maintain control over the dating partner.
How frequent is teen dating violence?
Forty percent of teenage girls between the ages of 14 and 17 report knowing someone their age who has been hurt or beaten by a boyfriend. (Childen Now/Kaiser Permanente, December 1995). Approximately one in five teenage girls is a victim of dating violence (Silverman, Raj, Mucci and Hathaway, 2001).
Who are the victims of teen dating violence?
The majority of information gathered over the years indicates that teen dating violence, like adult domestic violence, involves male on female violence in most cases (Levy, 1991; Foshee, 1996; Silverman, J. et al, 2001). Teen girls, significantly more often than boys, report that they experience severe violence (Molidor, C. & Tolman, R., 1998). Teen mothers are at a high risk for violence from their partners during both pregnancy and the postpartum period (Harrykissoon, Rickert & Wiemann, 2002).
Just as with adult battered women, victims of teen dating violence come from all walks of life, all races, all socioeconomic backgrounds and all religious communities.
What are additional health concerns for victims of teen dating violence?
Teen girls experiencing dating violence are at increased risk for substance abuse, eating disorders, risky sexual behavior, sexually-transmitted disease, pregnancy and suicide (Silverman, Raj, Mucci & Hathaway, 2001).
