Sources of Harm for Intimate Partner Violence Survivors in Social Media Spaces: Towards the Development of a Survivor-Centered Digital Citizenship Curriculum

Background: There is considerable evidence documenting the myriad harms associated with digital interactions in dating relationships. While much of this scholarship has focused on understanding and defining technology-facilitated coercive control within the context of intimate partner violence (IPV), there has been less attention regarding IPV survivors’ user experiences in social media spaces. Existing digital literacy curriculums often over-emphasize strengthening individual-level regulatory practices with limited attention to the dynamics of technology-facilitated dating abuse. The purpose of this paper is to broadly focus on the nature of IPV survivors’ digital engagement on social media, with specific attention to exploring the sources of harm. Ultimately, the findings in this study are being used to integrate survivor-centered tech safety practices into the development of a universal digital citizenship curriculum.

Methods: Key informant interviews (n=20) were conducted with a purposive sample of female-identified and gender-non-binary IPV survivors. Participants were recruited via social media platforms and through solicitation to service providers. Participants had direct experiences with sexual assault or IPV, but none of them were currently in abusive relationships. We utilized a semi-structured interview guide to elicit participants' perspectives on sources of digital harm and strategies to mitigate risk. We employed exploratory thematic content analysis, including multiple rounds of inductive coding to construct primary thematic domains.

Results: Study findings documented both IPV-specific sources of harm and indirect sources of harm in IPV survivors’ social media experiences. Sources of harm that are directly related to participants’ lived experiences of IPV include being exposed to permissive comments that minimize abuse experiences, opportunities to be contacted by former abusive partners or those in their social networks, and being exposed to reminders (e.g., old picture or posts) of the abusive relationship that can disrupt their healing trajectories. The most prominent sources of harm not directly related to IPV include triggering and unsupportive interactions with people in their social networks, exposure to discrimination and oppression (e.g., sexism, homophobia, and racism), receiving non-consensual and persistent direct messaging from strangers, being exposed to violent images (e.g., child abuse, community violence, images of war), and receiving advertising related to weight loss and plastic surgery.

Discussion: Technology is a critical piece of societal infrastructure that has the potential to facilitate or limit survivors’ everyday lived experiences. Although technology affords many opportunities to support survivor well-being, it also contributes to survivors’ exposure to direct and indirect sources of harm. It is noteworthy that negative interactions with people in survivors’ close personal social networks were perceived as being particularly insensitive and harmful. Thus, there is an important need to develop universal digital citizenship curriculums to nurture more trauma-responsive and healing interactions in social media spaces.