Every February, teens across America and their loved ones come together to raise awareness of teen dating violence in Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month.
How widespread is the issue of teen dating violence? How can you prevent it, and intervene when it does arise? And, how can you raise awareness of this major social issue?
The Scale of Teen Dating Violence
Young people aged between 12 and 19 suffer the highest rates of rape and sexual assault in the country. In fact, around one in 10 teenagers are subject to physical violence and personal injuries at the hands of their intimate partner during the previous year.
Teen dating violence can inflict major long-term personal injuries on victims, which include eating disorders, substance use, personality disorders and even suicide. Many teens who find themselves in abusive relationships will often repeat unhealthy patterns of violence in future relationships, meaning that they are at risk of being perpetrators or victims of intimate partner violence as adults.
Prevention Through Awareness
One of the most effective ways that you can help teens avoid violent relationships is through reaching out to them, whether it be as a teacher, parent or mentor, and helping them to understand the issues around teen dating violence.
An important place to start is by making sure teens are aware of the warning signs of dating abuse. An obvious place to start is helping to make sure teens are aware of the scope and nature of physical abuse, including threats, coercion, assault or grabbing.
Going beyond physical abuse, teens should also be aware of other forms of abuse, such as financial abuse, sexual abuse or emotional abuse. It’s important to make teens aware of the red flags that often go with these behaviors in the early stages of a relationship.
Creating Positive Role Models
But, alongside making teens aware of what an abusive relationship looks like, you should also talk to teens about what the characteristics of healthy relationships are. Through this, you can help teens in your life establish intimate relationships that can help them grow and prosper.
If you’re a parent, you can help teens by talking about good relationship patterns with your teen both before they start dating, and while they’re dating. It’s also important to talk about the role models teens are often subjected to in the media they consume, whether it be TV, movies, books, or games. You can also help teens by making sure that they understand more nuanced characteristics of relationships, such as respect for boundaries and the importance of communication.
Intervention Against Teen Dating Violence
Data from the Domestic Violence Awareness Project suggests that roughly 1.5 million American high school students are physically abused by a dating partner. If you know a teen that’s currently in such a relationship or is being subjected to emotional, sexual or any other form of abuse, there are channels by which you can intervene.
The first step, of course, is through spotting any red flags in a relationship and making it clear to a potential victim of teen dating violence that abusive behavior they spot is exactly that. You can make victims of teen dating violence aware of the resources they have to stop dating violence, such as the National Domestic Violence Hotline (NDVH), along with legal options such as protection orders.
Observing Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month
If you want to help raise awareness and encourage your community to talk about teen dating violence, Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month is a great time to do so.
NDVH provides a wide range of resources for workshops, classroom discussions, and conversations at home to help raise awareness and make sure teens are aware of both healthy and unhealthy relationship patterns.
In particular, it’s always worth asking local school teachers to include a discussion about healthy relationships in their February lesson plans, which they can find from NDVH. You can also help support youth-led events and projects to encourage teenagers to talk and act among themselves when it comes o teen dating violence.
Social media can also be a powerful tool to help spread awareness of teen dating violence and connect with teenagers about the issue. Along with promoting Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month on your personal social media channels, try connecting with local newspapers, schools, and organizations to spread the message far and wide.
Calling Time Out on Teen Dating Violence
Nearly a third of American teams will experience physical, sexual, or emotional abuse from someone they’re in a relationship with before they become adults.
This Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month is a chance for families and communities to bring down the number of young people in abusive relationships by arming teens with the knowledge and confidence to spot and walk away from them.
