Sexual Intercourse, School-Based Sexual Double Standards, and Teen Dating Violence

• In Event: Social Contexts of Teen Dating Violence and Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract

Some argue that teen dating violence is more likely to occur within relationships characterized by greater emotional involvement and sexual intimacy. Supportive research indicates that sexual intercourse increases adolescents’ risk of experiencing dating violence. Others argue that cultural features of adolescent contexts (e.g., schools) shape the association between sexual involvement and subsequent dating violence. Integrating insights from research on gender and teen dating violence, we examine whether school-based sexual double standards—that is, gender gaps in the perceived personal consequences of sexual activity within schools—alter the association between sexual intercourse within heterosexual adolescent romantic relationships and boys’ and girls’ subsequent risk of experiencing dating violence. Using multilevel discrete time event history models and data on adolescent romantic relationships from Add Health, we find sexual intercourse increases a girl’s hazard of experiencing dating violence, but only when the sexual double standard in her school is more severe. Conversely, sexual intercourse was not associated with the hazard of experiencing dating violence among boys across levels of the sexual double standard. Our results underscore the importance of considering gender and cultural contexts when investigating the relationship between sexual intercourse and subsequent dating violence.

Authors

• Brian Soller, University of New Mexico

• Dana Haynie, Ohio State University

• Elizabeth Sabbath, University of New Mexico