A survey of 5, 647 middle school students in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania by the Journal of Youth and Adolescence shows that more than 25% of those dating said they were harassed or threatened by their partners in texts or through online contact. The report published in February stated that technology was not the cause of teen dating abuse, but it gave access to abusers 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
“The technology opens up a wide avenue for someone who wants to be abusive toward their partner,” said Janine Zweig, lead author and researcher at the Urban Institute. “It’s another tool abusers can use to be relentless.”
“The survey is important in that it provides hard data to confirm what we already know — that domestic violence and dating violence occur where we live our lives,” said Cindy Southworth, founder of the Safety Net Project on technology at the National Network to End Domestic Violence. “These days, the digital world is our real world, and for teens even more so.”