To Screen or Not to Screen: Overreliance on Risk Without Protective Factors in Violence Research.

Abstract

Partner violence in the United States has received ubiquitous media attention over the past several months, with an overdue sexual assault reckoning unfolding across the country. This stance has resulted in a seismic shift in the cultural acceptance of traditional gender norms and decreased tolerance for dating violence perpetration. Thus, the timeliness of Cohen et al’s1 article, “Predicting Teen Dating Violence Perpetration,” cannot be understated. Their focus on developing an algorithm to identify which adolescents are most likely to perpetrate partner violence has significant ramifications, not only for adolescents but also for their broader social ecology. In this commentary, we draw attention to the risks and benefits of using such a screening process in research and clinical work as well as to the need for a more balanced assessment of multilevel protective factors. Last, we highlight the value of using syndemics2 (ie, the co-occurrence of multiple epidemics) as a guiding theory for future research on teen-aged dating violence. Cohen et al1 are to be commended for their innovative research, in which they used statistically driven methods (ie, net … Address correspondence to Idia B. Thurston, PhD, Department of Psychology, The University of Memphis, 310 Psychology Building, Memphis, TN 38152. E-mail: bthrston{at}memphis.edu