Teen Dating Violence Grows

The CDC defines Teen Dating Violence “as the physical, sexual, psychological, or emotional violence within a dating relationship, including stalking. It can occur in person or electronically.”

Today we will share with you some more stories about teen dating violence. I’ve written before about my belief that teen dating violence is a precursor to domestic violence

In some of our previous stories we have written about teenage dating violence. The statistics are very appalling! A 2011 CDC nationwide survey found that 23% of females and 14% of males who ever experienced rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner, first experienced some form of partner violence between 11 and 17 years of age. A 2013 survey found approximately 10% of high school students reported physical victimization and 10% reported sexual victimization from a dating partner in the 12 months before they were surveyed.

In this article by the Washington Post about Teen Dating Violence the authors claim that the overwhelming majority of teens actually witness dating aggression and sexual violence among their peers but choose not to intervene mostly because they don’t want to fuel the situation and add to the drama sometimes because they’re afraid of second-guessing a more popular kid. A small study conducted by researchers at the University of New Hampshire surveyed 218 students and found that nine out of every 10 students surveyed said they had at least one opportunity to intervene in situations of dating violence. The actual average was five situations in which they could have done so. One of the reasons given why they didn’t was that they wanted to watch the drama unfold-to see what happened!

The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston released new findings recently about teenage dating abuse specifically on cyber dating. This seems to be the first study to examine the relationship over time between traditional dating abuse and cyber abuse. As you can imagine, teenagers are much more likely to use technology to communicate and thus have a propensity to be involved in cyber dating abuse. The study concluded that teenagers who were the victim of either cyber or traditional dating abuse were likely to be victimized by cyber dating abuse within the next year.

This story from the Huffington Post claims that dating violence is a prevalent social issue for teenagers. It also claims that: 1.5 million high school students experience physical abuse from a dating partner. Only 33% of teens who are in a violent relationship ever told anyone about it; and finally, 81% of parents don’t believe that teen dating violence is an issue.

Teens should learn how to defend themselves and carry a nonlethal self-defense pepper spray-preferably one that’s on a keychain so it can be with you virtually all the time.

As of this writing we carry the largest selection of pepper sprays on the Internet, approximately 200 to choose from. We recommend these keychain pepper sprays because they are much more likely to be with you when you need it-which can be any time.

What is your personal first-hand experience with teen dating violence with either yourself or someone you know? Share your thoughts and feelings here so that others may benefit from them.