Abstract
Dating violence is a multidimensional and cross-cultural problem that in the last decade has extended worryingly to teenage age. The consequences are so serious and lasting over time that they cause serious psychological, educational, family and social implications. Knowledge of predictive indicators and the consequences that these aggression and victimization processes cause, can offer an important guide for the design of prevention and intervention protocols that contribute to decrease the prevalence of cases, to facilitate their identification, to give an answer faster and more efficient. This study emphasizes the moral development of adolescents as a key indicator and, specifically, in the level of moral disengagement they present. The aims are: a) Analyze the level of moral disengagement of adolescents, as well as the mechanisms they use to accept and normalize violent behaviors; b) Know what mechanisms of moral disengagement predict certain forms of aggression in dating relationships. The sample consists of 2029 adolescents (55.4% girls) with ages between 14 and 18 years (M = 16.2; SD = 1.2). The results indicate that adolescents have a moderate level of moral disengagement (M = 2,562; SD = 0.4362) and the most commonly used disengagement mechanisms coincide with the diffusion and displacement of responsibility for the damage caused. As the level of disengagement increases, the mechanisms that adolescents use to validate and approve aggressive behaviors committed and suffered are diversified. Finally, it is found that the use of mechanisms such as dehumanization and euphemistic language are strong predictors of certain forms of victimization.
Highlights
Violence in adolescent dating is a poorly recognized social health problem that affects millions of young people around the world every year
This acceptance is considered an element of risk related to the European Journal of Teaching and Education,2 (3):50-58, 2020 chronification of the phenomenon throughout life, to the point that it is common to find that victimized adolescents end up becoming victimized adults (Spriggs et al, 2009). 1.1 Dating violence and moral disengagement Dating violence is an important health problem among adoelscents and young adults for its implications on physical and mental health and its consequences for individual and social development
The term moral disengagement was coined by Bandura, Barbaranelli, Caprara & Pastorelli (1996) to refer to the process or processes used to legitimize behaviour that goes against the beliefs, values, and norms of the victims
Summary
Violence in adolescent dating is a poorly recognized social health problem that affects millions of young people around the world every year This phenomenon implies a series of violent and abusive behaviors directed towards the couple whose ultimate purpose is to establish and maintain control over it. Studies focused on identifying and analysing specific moral disengagement mechanisms warn that aggressors accuse the victims of being mainly responsible for the situation they have lived through (Boulton & Underwood, 1992). In this sense, Camodeca and Gossens (2005) indicate that aggressors claim to feel anger when they commit an aggressive act, and that this anger is greater the more hostility they previously attribute to the victims' intentions. The aims are: a) Analyze the level of moral disengagement of adolescents, as well as the mechanisms they use to accept and normalize violent behaviors; b) Know what mechanisms of moral disengagement predict certain forms of aggression in dating relationships
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