Attitudes about Violence and Dating Among Latino/a Boys and Girls

ABSTRACT

This study examined the relationship between acculturation, gender stereotypes, and recent aversive and fearful dating experiences, and attitudes about dating violence in dating, urban Latina/o youth (N = 442). All participants completed self-administered surveys at school. Relative to girls, boys held more attitudes accepting of dating violence. Females reported less belief in stereotyped gender roles (i.e., more belief in gender role egalitarianism) than males. Adolescents with higher levels of Spanish language media use were more likely to endorse traditional rather than egalitarian gender roles. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that gender was an important predictor of dating violence attitudes even after other variables were controlled. Implications for dating violence interventions and future directions for research are explored.

KEYWORDS:

• Dating violence
• Latino/a youth populations
• perceived dating violence norms
• acculturation

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by US4/CCU918991 Cooperative Agreement from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to Lisa H. Jaycox.