Longitudinal Data on Teen Dating Violence: Meeting Summary

• NCJ Number: 236303
• Date Published: June 2011
• Length: 8 pages
• Agencies: NIJ
• Publication Type: Issue Overview; Research (Applied/Empirical)

Annotation

This report summarizes the presentations given at a conference on June 7-8, 2011, that discussed "Longitudinal Data on Teen Dating Violence."

Abstract

The discussion opened with comments from Katrina Baum, the Division Director of the Violence and Victimization Research Division of the U.S. Justice Department's Violence and Victimization Research Division. She notes that there is widespread agreement among practitioners and policymakers that teen dating violence (TDV) is a critical public health issue. She advises that high prevalence rates, association, and a range of negative correlates for both victims and perpetrators make TDV an issue that must be examined more closely. This involves a commitment to advancing knowledge and disseminating information about TDV. She identified four groups selected to attend this conference: representatives from research groups that use existing longitudinal data sets collected for other primary purposes; representatives from research groups using longitudinal data sets that begin or continue into middle childhood/early adolescence; experts on TDV research; and Federal partners. The substantive discussion began with an assessment of the current state of knowledge about TDV based on what is known from longitudinal published studies. Several TDV experts were then asked to respond and add to the conversations about what is known about adolescent relationship abuse from existing longitudinal data. The experts were also asked to comment on which key questions still must be answered through longitudinal data. Five major themes/ideas eventually emerged from the meeting: The necessity to pool results from numerous studies of TDV; the need for a meta-analysis of existing research; the importance of developing measures of TDV; the importance of bringing a theoretical perspective to work in TDV; and the need to analyze the role of technology in dating violence. 14 references