A new study in the American Journal of Men’s Health interviewed 19 young men who have abused their female intimate girlfriends or partners. The authors of the study wanted to look beyond the young men’s individual behaviors to the context of their social environments in order to find any patterns in their life histories. The study concluded that patterns do exist. More than half these men had experienced one or more of five factors while they were growing up. The factors were a negative home life, no positive male role model, a negative peer environment (including criminal and abusive behaviors), an unsupportive school environment and experiencing violence in their community. The authors caution against making generalizations based on these findings because these men are not a representative sample of all young men who commit dating violence against women in the United States. All 19 men interviewed were aged 17 to 21 years old, were enrolled in programs for dating violence perpetrators, and most lived in the Boston, Massachusetts, area. The authors recommend further studies on these five issues in order to develop better dating violence prevention and intervention programs.
Compiled from:
Family Violence Prevention Fund, Newsflash: A Look at Young Men Who Commit Dating Violence (29 October 2008).
Reed, Elizabeth et al., Social and Environmental Contexts of Adolescent and Young Adult Male Perpetrators of Intimate Partner Violence: A Qualitative Study, in American Journal of Men's Health, Vol. 2, No. 3, 260-271 (1 September 2008). (Abstract).