Safe on-Line and Off-Line Spaces”: Teens Using Digital Media to Prevent Dating Violence and Sexual Assault in Their Community

Background: Digital media (Internet and cell phones) are an increasingly important social relational context for youth. The influence of media on beliefs and behavior is well documented, but digital media provides a means through which teens simultaneously consume andcreate their own media. Digital media can be a medium for social skills growth, healthy sexual exploration, and identity development. However, the ubiquitous and public nature of these technologies may also put teens at a risk for harassment, stalking, dating violence, and sexual coercion. Patterns of harmful digital dating behaviors, which we call “digital dating abuse” (DDA) can include monitoring someone’s activities and whereabouts, controlling whom they talk to and are friends with, threats and hostility, and pressuring for sexual behavior using cell phones and the Internet (Author, in press).

Method:We are engaged in youth participatory action research to develop a teen-led school-based prevention program called “Safe On-line and Off-line Spaces” (SOS). To inform this project, we conducted an on-line survey study with a diverse sample of 948 students from three high schools (71% White, 6.9% Black, 6.6% Asian; 74.2% reporting any dating experience, 21.7% participate in free lunch program) on the motivation, experience, and consequences of DDA with their current or most recent dating partner (adapted from Author, in press). This research provides the basis for a participatory action research project in these same three schools, to empower high school students to take action to address the findings of the online survey. We have partnered with administrators and a teacher sponsor to support students forming the “SOS” group to engage in community projects aimed changing the school culture of tolerance around sexist, homophobic, racist, and rape culture-promoting attitudes and behaviors both in school and on-line. Teens are developing a workshop based on the survey response data that they will present to their student peers, teachers, administration, and the community and will help plan and implement additional data gathering.

Results: Preliminary results from the survey study show evidence of DDA involvement among teen sample: 21.9% have been pressured by their most recent dating partner to send a “sext” and 19.9% have been pressured to engage in sexual behavior using digital media. Further results from the survey research will be presented to illustrate a broader discussion of the importance of digital media in teen dating relationships, digital media as a context and tool for dating violence and sexual assault, and digital media as a tool for social change in our SOS project.

Implications: Our work shows the great implications of digital media for the study and prevention of dating violence and sexual assault among teens, supporting the need for social work researchers and practitioners to recognize the central role of digital media in teens’ social worlds and dating relationships. While digital media poses many risks for teens in their relationships, our “SOS” project demonstrates that it also provides a unique opportunity to intervene in the same relational space where violence and abuse can occur.