Domestic Violence Among High School, College Students is Alarming

Experts Look at Why and Identify Common, Complex Triggers

The number of high school and college students - both males and females - involved in violent or abusive relationships is alarming says Dr. Sandra Stith, director of the marriage and family therapy program at Kansas State University. An increasing number of teens and young adults are victims of domestic violence involving everything from sexual abuse and rape to pushing, slapping and punching to stalking and emotional abuse.

In a Sept. 12 press release, Stith, a nationally recognized domestic violence expert and a pioneer in couples treatment for domestic violence, says that about "30 percent of college students have been in relationships that involve physical aggression. Even more have been in relationships that are emotionally abusive." High school students in abusive relationships number about one in four, or 25 percent, she says.

According to the statistics of the Alabama Coalition Against Domestic Violence (ACADV), the college and high school domestic violence numbers are similarly alarming. The ACADV says one in five college females will experience some form of violence while in a dating relationship; about one in three high school students have been or will be involved in an abusive relationship. Further, a survey of teens and college students found that date rape accounted for 67 percent of sexual assaults.

Stith and others are clear in their assertion that there is no cut and dried answer as to why violence within young relationships is occurring at its current rate. Stith says the triggers are many and complex. Nonetheless, she identifies stress, the inability to control one's anger and highly intense relationships as common triggers.

She also said that many students in abusive relationships really believe they don't deserve anything better. Or they believe that controlling and abusive language and physical aggression are acceptable in their dealings with other people. But Stith said society needs to "send a clear message that abuse in any form is not normal, not acceptable and not OK."