Transforming Violent Selves Through Reflection in Critical Communicative Research

Abstract

Currently, teenagers are being socialized into a world of violent realities, not only through social interaction but also through interaction via the media, especially via the Internet. Research conducted using the critical communicative methodology has shown that this methodology helps young people to reflect critically about their violent identities in relation to their sexual and affective relationships. It presents opportunities for research participants to question and transform themselves during the research process. In this article, we focus on this transformative dimension of the methodology and illustrate it with qualitative empirical material from two research studies conducted with Spanish youth. One focuses on communicative acts and other on preventing the socialization of gender violence.