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1 in 10 teens suffer abuse in romantic relationships, and many think it's often justified
By Megan Twohey and Bonnie Miller Rubin | Tribune reporters
February 20, 2009
Ed Loos, a junior at Lake Forest High School, said a common reaction among students to Chris Brown's alleged attack on Rihanna goes something like this: "Ha! She probably did something to provoke it."
In Chicago, Sullivan High School sophomore Adeola Matanmi has heard the same.
"People said, 'I would have punched her around too,' " Matanmi said. "And these were girls!"
As allegations of battery swirl around the famous couple, experts on domestic violence say the response from teenagers just a few years younger shows the desperate need to educate this age group about dating violence.
In recent years, some schools and youth organizations have started educating teens about the dangers of dating violence. Rhode Island and Virginia have adopted laws requiring such instruction in the public schools.
But most states, including Illinois, don't have such a mandate, and education on the topic remains in short supply, experts say. Two of three new programs created by the federal Violence Against Women Act in 2005 to address teen dating violence were never funded.
"This incident has brought the issue into sharp focus," said Esta Soler, president of the California-based Family Violence Prevention Fund. "This type of education is not happening in any broad or consistent way. We need to take it to scale, to make sure it's happening in every community."
Details of the incident between singers Brown and Rihanna are fuzzy, but the story continues to create much buzz among teens across the Chicago area. Because she's 21 and he's 19, many teens see them as peers.
Katie Lullo, a junior at Elk Grove High School, said her classmates and friends were upset. "No one thinks it's right for a guy to hit a girl," she said. And when the topic arose at an after-school program at Evanston's YMCA, many participants said abuse was "bogus."
But other teens insist violence is sometimes justified in relationships.
While young fans have plastered Rihanna's MySpace page with notes of support, many comments on Brown's page express delight at the possibility that he battered a woman.
Kriana Jackson, a sophomore at Sullivan, said it's a sign of a broader culture of acceptance of abuse.
"There was a girl at school this week with a scratch on her eye," Jackson said. "She was talking openly about her boyfriend hitting her, but she was smiling and saying it was funny."
Young people carry these attitudes into adulthood, experts say, and young targets of dating violence are more likely to succumb to aggression in later relationships.
For that reason, experts see education and other prevention initiatives geared at teens and preteens as one of the best hopes for halting dating and domestic violence.
"We know that education is absolutely crucial to breaking the cycle of abuse and strengthening healthy relationships," said Candice Hopkins, director of loveisrespect.org, the National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline, which started in 2007 and receives about 90 contacts a week.
Because young victims move in a different world than that of older people, they require unique interventions.
Text messaging and online social-networking sites, especially popular among teenagers, serve as tools for stalking and harassment. Victims often keep quiet, fearing that if they report another student's aggressive behavior, they will be socially ostracizedor that their parents will confiscate their cell phone or close a Facebook account.
Teens also can have a harder time severing contact with an abuser. Many are forced to see the perpetrator every day at school, sometimes in the same class. Young adults seeking an order of protection from Cook County judges must bring a guardian to apply on their behalf.
Last summer, the president of the National Association of Attorneys General launched a campaign called "Working Together to End the Violence" and specifically called on communities to focus on relationship abuse among young people. More recently, the Family Violence Prevention Fund launched a national public-service advertising campaign this month called "That's Not Cool" to help teens recognize digital dating abuse and take steps to prevent it.
The Chicago-based group Between Friends is among the non-profit organizations that go into schools to teach students about the signs of abusive control, why it's wrong and how to cultivate heathy relationships.
"When we first get there, it's not unusual for kidsboth boys and girlsto say it's OK to hit your girlfriend or boyfriend," said Kathy Doherty, the organization's executive director. "By the time we're done, they say, yes, it is abuse, and, no, we shouldn't do that."
As Doherty and others work to expand such programming, they hope teachers, parents and others use the story about Brown and Rihanna to talk to teens about dating violence.
Loos said his law teacher at Lake Forest recently incorporated the story into class.
The Intimate Partner Violence survey finds that in the most recent five years, 2001-05, teens age 16-19 had lower rates of intimate-partner violence (3.4%) than adults age 20-24 (6.5%) and 25-34 (4.7%) and somewhat above adults age 35-49 (2.8%), while 12-15-year-olds experienced the lowest levels of dating violence (0.9%) of any age except 65 and older (less than 0.1%). Given that intimate partner violence rises sharply as socioeconomic status falls7 and that teenagers and young adults suffer considerably higher rates of poverty and socioeconomic disadvantage than older adults, teens appear to experience fairly low rates of intimate partner violence for their demographics.
I saw no source for the claim that "1 in 10 teens suffer abuse in romantic relationships." I would question the veracity of that claim, considering the tactics used by some pollsters to artificially inflate the rate of teenage violence. For instance, the "abuse" referred to in this report could very well be nothing more than negative verbal remarks made on occasion, a polling tactic used in the past.
Though it's somewhat dated, I've still found that YouthFacts has offered an analysis of teenage dating violence and abuse uncolored by the bias of the mass media: "Teen Dating violence": the invented "epidemic".
The Intimate Partner Violence survey finds that in the most recent five years, 2001-05, teens age 16-19 had lower rates of intimate-partner violence (3.4%) than adults age 20-24 (6.5%) and 25-34 (4.7%) and somewhat above adults age 35-49 (2.8%), while 12-15-year-olds experienced the lowest levels of dating violence (0.9%) of any age except 65 and older (less than 0.1%). Given that intimate partner violence rises sharply as socioeconomic status falls7 and that teenagers and young adults suffer considerably higher rates of poverty and socioeconomic disadvantage than older adults, teens appear to experience fairly low rates of intimate partner violence for their demographics.
I saw no source for the claim that "1 in 10 teens suffer abuse in romantic relationships." I would question the veracity of that claim, considering the tactics used by some pollsters to artificially inflate the rate of teenage violence. For instance, the "abuse" referred to in this report could very well be nothing more than negative verbal remarks made on occasion, a polling tactic used in the past.
Though it's somewhat dated, I've still found that YouthFacts has offered an analysis of teenage dating violence and abuse uncolored by the bias of the mass media:
The Intimate Partner Violence survey finds that in the most recent five years, 2001-05, teens age 16-19 had lower rates of intimate-partner violence (3.4%) than adults age 20-24 (6.5%) and 25-34 (4.7%) and somewhat above adults age 35-49 (2.8%), while 12-15-year-olds experienced the lowest levels of dating violence (0.9%) of any age except 65 and older (less than 0.1%). Given that intimate partner violence rises sharply as socioeconomic status falls7 and that teenagers and young adults suffer considerably higher rates of poverty and socioeconomic disadvantage than older adults, teens appear to experience fairly low rates of intimate partner violence for their demographics.
Ease up Agna, no need to get so defensive. Allow me to suggest that this issue has been around a while and that it's almost an inter-generational thing. I appreciate your statistics but here's something from real life. In those areas of lower socio-economic conditions people don't live entirely private lives. If a woman is bashed and she is confident enough to trust the criminal justice system she will call the cops. Heck in those areas, in my experience, people call the cops for just about anything because they don't know who else to call and because they know cops understand them. That might sound paradoxical to you but I have a thousand personal anecdotes. And again from personal experience - not as a cop - women who are beaten up by their spouse in what Americans call "silk stocking districts" won't call the cops. There are a couple of reasons for that. One is that cops are lower in status and that means she will have to share familial confidences with someone of lower status. The second reason is that they're frightened that the cops will gossip (with good reason). So she goes to the family doctor, not the cops.
Having said that let me put this in a generational aspect and explain why this is important. My father's generation and his before him though that a bit of smacking around the wife was alright. Not my father I hasten to add, broadly speaking his generation.
If you've ever read "The Uses of Literacy" by Richard Hoggart you'll see that (it's an interesting book, it's been described as a book of two halves and it really is) when Hoggart is reflecting on his days growing up in the north of England that it was quite acceptable for a man to bash his wife now and again.
My generation - I am a hated baby-boomer - grew up believing it was wrong to bash your wife. But it happens. However in my generation we hide it because we're ashamed when it happens - see my comments above. The problem here is that it would appear that bashing the mrs is being seen as acceptable again. I hope this is wrong, but I fear it's an accurate reporting of current attitudes among younger people. The way to sort that out is education and no denial. If it's not happening then fine, but if it is it has to be faced up to.
I always thought it was the other way around, that the older generation found hitting women to be a grave sin, of course I was born in the 70's so my knowledge is limited. I do know that when I was a teen sexual abuse amongst teens were more prevalent than physical abuse. Maybe it was just my circle but most of my friends had either been raped or sexually assaulted, and it was considered normal. So normal that when it happened it wasn't a big deal, and I'm speaking from personal experience as well.
