Abstract
Research in psychology has evidenced both the prevalence of gender-based violence among youth worldwide and the negative impacts that such violence has on the victims’ mental and physical health. Neuroscience has proven that violent intimate relationships harm the brain, while very simple social experiences can change the brain architecture in positive directions. Also, interventions that have been demonstrated to be successful in preventing and responding to gender violence in adolescence have been informed by psychology. This article reviews the social impact of psychology in the field of teen gender violence and then reports on the potential social impact achieved by an intervention study consisting of seven interventions framed by the research line on the preventive socialization of gender violence. The program was addressed to 15- and 16-year-old adolescents and focused on supporting free reconstruction of mental and affective models of attractiveness via critical analysis of the dominant coercive discourse, which links attraction to violence. The communicative methodology involved working with an Advisory Committee from the beginning of the study, as well as continuous dialog between the researchers and the participants, which was used to refine subsequent interventions. The results show that the program contributed to raising participants’ critical consciousness regarding the dominant coercive discourse in their life, provided the participant subjects with cognitive tools to better understand their own and others’ sexual-affective thinking, emotions, and behaviors, in favor of rejecting violence, and supported the modification of female adolescents’ sexual preferences for different types of men. Importantly, the findings also indicate that the interventions aided some participants’ use of the knowledge gained in the project to help their friends and communities in reflecting upon coercive patterns of sexual attraction, the quality of their intimate relationships, and the different effects of sexual violence and toxic relationships on health. Some individuals reported leaving toxic relationships after the interventions. This intervention research illustrates Santiago Ramón y Cajal’s metaphor, employed to explain plasticity: that every person, if s/he decides it, can be the architect of her or his own brain. With evidence-based cognitive tools within the reach of every adolescent, and upon individual free choice for transformation, a new sexual-affective socialization free from violence is possible.
Highlights
SOCIAL IMPACT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON GENDER VIOLENCEThe research and innovation framework defined by the European Union, Horizon 2020, leaves no doubt about the need for science to be carried out with and for society (European Commission, 2014)
We report data from (a) 10 communicative focus groups that were conducted in the three high schools, in post-test 2, to examine the impact of the project’s interventions on adolescents’ mental and affective models related to sexual attraction and gender violence, as well as upon their and their peers’ behavior, and (b) the surveys that evaluated adolescents’ perception about the value of every intervention
In one of the focus groups, Ana explained that the interventions made her recall some movies that she had watched in the past. She emphasized that she experienced this with the movie “Three Steps Above Heaven,” a very famous movie among adolescents that shares the relationship between an aggressive conflictive boy, who is presented as highly sexually desired and successful among women, and an upper-class girl. At first, she did not realize that the popular boy in the movie was aggressive— she had a different image of him—but after the interventions she recalled the movie and was able to analyze it through the lenses of the dominant coercive discourse, acknowledging that Hache, the main character, was violent: Ana: When I came out of the cinema, I saw the main character in a specific way
Summary
SOCIAL IMPACT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON GENDER VIOLENCEThe research and innovation framework defined by the European Union, Horizon 2020, leaves no doubt about the need for science to be carried out with and for society (European Commission, 2014). The social problems to be addressed by researchers are set by citizens and global institutions. The United Nations’ 2030 Agenda in relation to sustainable development has shared 17 goals that are central to promoting prosperity and protecting the planet and which must be assumed by all countries, poor, rich, and middle-income. One of those goals, number five, focuses on gender equality, and gender violence is identified as one central target for making the goal real. Overcoming gender violence is a global social concern that urges evidence-based solutions
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