The Psychology of Violence in Adolescent Romantic Relationships

Domestic violence in adolescent romantic relationships is an increasingly important and only recently acknowledged social issue. This book examines what we mean by 'adolescent dating violence', its effects and its causes. With a detailed survey of the current literature on the topic, the authors move on to examine what is known about how best to intervene in, and assess risk for adolescent dating violence. The book provides conceptual frameworks for the design and evaluation of interventions with a focus on developing evidence based practice, as well as a research, practice and policy agenda for consideration. This book will be highly important to policy-makers, practitioners and researchers seeking to understand and intervene in cases of teen dating violence.

Erica Bowen is Professor in the Psychology of Violence and Interpersonal Aggression at Coventry University, UK, where she is the Director of the Violence and Interpersonal Aggression research group (www.coventry.ac.uk/via). During the past 15 years her research has focused on preventing violence in intimate relationships in both criminal justice adult and school-based populations.

Kate Walker is a Research Associate in Violence and Interpersonal Aggression at Coventry University, UK. Her primarily qualitative research has focused on understanding the processes of change in men who have been violent towards their intimate partners in both criminal justice and community intervention settings. More recently her research focus has included evaluating a serious-game based primary intervention for adolescents.