1. Teen Dating Violence Within and Outside Honor Cultures
Kiersten R. Baughman
University of the Cumberlands
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Figure 1. Average dating violence rate among teen girl victims as a function of year in school by culture of honor status.
Introduction
The Culture of Honor can be found worldwide as well as in the U.S. South and West, refers to the ideals of a reputation-based society, and often results in high rates of violence (Vandello & Cohen, 2003; Vandello et al., 2009).
Previous work has been inconclusive in whether boys or girls perpetrate more violence in romantic relationships (see Archer, 2000), and exactly how early in life honor ideals influence behavior remains an open question.
The current study sought to determine whether teen boys or girls report higher levels of partner victimization, and what role, if any, honor values have.
Specifically, I predicted that girls would report higher rates of dating violence victimization than boys, and that violence rates would be higher in regions governed by honor norms.
Figure 2. Average dating violence rate among teen boy victims as a function of year in school by culture of honor status.
Method
Data were obtained from the Youth Risk Behavioral Surveillance survey (YRBS) for high school students across the U.S. from the years 2005, 2007, 2009, 2011, and 2013.
107,335 White high school students responded to the question, “Have you been hit, slapped, or physically hurt on purpose by your boyfriend or girlfriend in the past year?”
In order to divide the students by region, states in U.S. South and West were labeled “honor” and states in U.S. North were labeled “non-honor.” Covariates included rurality, economic deprivation, and mean annual temperature.
Discussion
The high school students in this archival study who reported the highest levels of dating violence victimization were junior and senior girls in honor states.
Among teen boy victims, there was no significant difference in rate based on honor classification (although a trend of higher rates in honor states).
Girls outside the culture of honor report significantly higher rates of victimization than boys in honor states.
There seems to be something unique to being a girl that puts her at elevated risk of experiencing dating violence, particularly when she is in a state governed by honor norms.
These results are consistent with higher rates of intimate partner violence in honor regions, but are the first to demonstrate such a pattern in high school.
Patterns only hold for White teens, so generalization to other demographics is unknown (but this is in line with other honor work).
The nature of the survey question cannot address who instigated violence, so boy victimization rate could be capturing girls acting in self-defense.
Future work aiming to highlight role of honor on developing romantic relationships need not examine kids younger than high school.
Perhaps girls in honor states are socialized to see the bright side of “bad boys” and could experience high rates of violence as a result.
Year in School
Year in School
Results
7,319 White teens indicated dating violence victimization (4,321 girls and 4,973 teens from honor states).
Independent samples t-test revealed that significantly more girls reported victimization in honor states compared to non-honor states.
Dependent groups ANCOVA revealed that juniors and seniors report significantly higher victimization than freshmen and sophomores.
See Figures 1 and 2 for graphical representation of the average state-level dating violence rates among high school girls and boys as victims as a function of grade level and honor classification.
References
Archer, J. (2000). Sex differences in aggression between heterosexual partners: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 126(5),
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) High School Youth Risk Behavior Survey Data. Available at Accessed on [7-3-15].
Vandello, J. A., & Cohen, D. (2003). Male honor and female fidelity: Implicit cultural scripts that perpetuate domestic violence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(5),
Vandello, J. A., Cohen, D., Grandon, R., & Franiuk, R. (2009). Stand by your man: Indirect prescriptions for honorable violence and feminine loyalty in Canada, Chile, and the United States. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 40,
Vandello, J. A., Cohen, D., & Ransom, S. (2008). U.S. southern and northern differences in perceptions of norms about aggression: Mechanisms for the perpetuation of a culture of honor. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 39,