Teen dating abuse usually includes some combination of physical, emotional, sexual, technological abuse and stalking. These terms are further defined with examples below.
- Physical forms of abuse may include hitting, punching, pinching, pushing, shoving, grabbing, slapping, kicking, choking, pulling hair, biting, throwing things, or arm twisting.
- Emotional abuse involves the intentional infliction of emotional distress by threat, coercion or humiliation. Behaviors may include put-downs; name calling; intense jealousy; controlling activities, appearance or friendships; social sabotage; making threats to harm one’s dating partner or oneself.
- Sexual abuse encompasses any unwanted sexual contact; it may occur between intimates, acquaintances or strangers. Behaviors range from unwanted touching through forced sex and may include behaviors like reproductive control and birth control sabotage.
- Technological abuse includes behaviors enacted online, through tracking technologies, or through cellphones that are intended to harm, intimidate, monitor, coerce or control their target. This can look like repeated calls or text messages; non-consensual access to email or social networking sites; creating a false social media site or impersonating the target on social media.
- Stalking involves a repeat pattern of harassing or threatening tactics that are unwanted and cause the target of these behaviors to feel unsafe or afraid. Behaviors may include following,
How does it impact teens?
TDA impacts more than just teens’ social relationships. Both perpetrators and victims of TDA are at an increased risk of a broad range of physical, emotional, psychological, social, behavioral and academic problems.
- Students who experienced physical violence had lower grades; 20% of these students had mostly D’s/F’s and only 6% had mostly A’s (Liz Claiborne, TRU, 2008).
- Witnessing violence has been associated with decreased school attendance and academic performance (Eaton, Davis, Barrios, Brener and Noonan, 2007).
- Teen victims of physical dating violence are more likely than their non-abused peers to smoke, use drugs, engage in unhealthy diet behaviors (taking diet pills or laxatives and vomiting to lose weight), engage in risky sexual behaviors, and attempt or consider suicide (Liz Claiborne, TRU, 2008).
- Girls who experience relationship violence are up to 6 times more likely to become pregnant and more than 2 times as likely to report a sexually transmitted disease (Liz Claiborne, TRU, 2008).
- Physically abused teens are 3 times more likely than non-abused peers to experience violence during college (Liz Claiborne, TRU, 2008).
TDA is destructive for our kids as individuals, and in the long run, it’s destructive to the safety, health, productivity, and social cohesion of our communities.
Adult Influence Matters
In a national study only about 25% of parents reported talking with their kids about dating relationships (GfK, 2013). We’ve talked with groups of parents across Indiana to try to understand why we aren’t having these conversations. The parents we talked with described the fears that make it hard for them to discuss relationships with their kids:
- They didn’t know how—their parents didn’t have this conversation with them.
- They didn’t feel like their opinions were relevant to their kids—they didn’t feel like they knew the “right lingo” and didn’t think that their kids would listen to them because they were “out of touch”.
- They were afraid that they couldn’t keep their kids safe—even if they talked with their kids about healthy relationships, they didn’t think that their influence could help to keep them safe from abuse.
We spoke with hundreds of Indiana teens about the fears that parents identified, and they told us that they want to hear from their parents. Though they want to be trusted with the autonomy to work through things for themselves, they also want guidance from their parents. Teen told us things like:
I would love it if my parents talked with me more. I’d love it if they asked me about my day.
I think that conversations about relationships should probably begin before preschool.
Though teens are working to develop their own identities and to distinguish themselves from their families in adolescence, they say that they do want support and information from adults. And research shows that when adults talk with kids about relationships, it helps to set them up to have great ones.
Keep reading for conversation starters and tips:
Setting the Stage
How can you set the stage to have great conversations with your kids about relationships? The Indiana teens that we spoke with told us many times that the key is to talk with, rather than at, the kids in your life. Talking with youth about their relationships doesn’t mean telling them what to do; this almost never works. The most effective strategy will lie in the sweet spot between representing your point of view and respecting their experience and perspective.
Helpful Strategies (Talking With)
These strategies strengthen connections between you and your teen and help you to sort out relationship issues together.
- Negotiating to create your family’s rules
- Having open conversations about values
- Supporting your teen in troubleshooting relationship challenges
- Providing empathetic support with statements like:
- I’m really glad that you felt like you could talk with me about this situation
- I’m not sure what the best answer is, but we can talk through the possibilities together
- Understanding that teen relationships are serious and matter deeply to adolescents
- Introducing the conversation and inviting opportunities to talk
- Meeting your teen where they are, as the unique individual that they are
- Accepting/working through the answers that you receive from your teen
- Being mindful of listening as much as you talk
- Promoting the positive relationship behaviors that you believe your child should give and receive
Not so helpful strategies (talking at)
These strategies reinforce separations between you and your teen and make it tougher for them to come to you.
- Dealing in absolutes
- Censoring ideas and shutting down discussion
- Telling your teens what they have to do
- Judging with any statements like:
- I just don’t understand teens today….
- He (or she) is a jerk and you just need to…
- Minimizing the importance of the relationship
- Interrogating–forcing the conversation when teens are busy, preoccupied, or just not into it
- Comparing your teen to others—siblings, friends, or even yourself
- Playing “gotcha”—inviting open conversation, then punishing your teen for answers that you weren’t prepared to hear
- Monologue-ing
- Sounding the alarm–focusing just on the negative behaviors that you think your teen should avoid
It can be challenging to loosen the reigns—especially when we care so much about the wellbeing of the teens in our lives. This advice doesn’t mean not having rules, it means creating safe space with your kids where honest conversations can happen. In our zeal to protect them, we may sometimes get it wrong. Luckily, this isn’t a one-time pass/fail type of conversation. Talking with young people about healthy relationships is a process that unfolds as they develop. You will have many conversations about feelings, fairness, respect, intimacy, consent, boundaries and break-ups.
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