Virginia Sánchez
University of Sevilla
Interpersonal Violence in Adolescence and Gender: Keys to Understanding and Intervention
Participants: Valentina Zambuto1; Mónica Ojeda2; Natalia Albadalejo3 and María Luisa Rodríguez de Arriba2
1University of Florence; 2University of Seville; 3University of Alicante
Symposium Summary
Studies on interpersonal violence in adolescence describe gender differences in the involvement in phenomena such as bullying, cyberbullying, sexual violence and violence in adolescent couples. This gender moderating effect has also made it possible to describe the existence of common and differential risk factors, as well as different experiences of victimization in boys and girls. However, the results are contradictory when analyzing emerging phenomena of violence, such as sexting, cyberbullying, online violence in couple relationships, or when analyzing the effectiveness of interpersonal violence prevention programs in boys and girls.
The contributions presented in this symposium deepen the importance of considering gender for the understanding of nature and intervention against interpersonal violence. Specifically, it describes the contribution of gender in the understanding of emerging phenomena in the online context, such as sexting, cybergossip or online sexual violence, but also in the greater or lesser effectiveness of preventive programs against bullying, cyberbullying, and violence in adolescent couples. Both prevalence studies and analysis of the effectiveness of intervention programmes in which gender analysis is the central focus are presented. From the results, conclusions are drawn that indicate that gender continues to moderate both the prevalence of emerging phenomena and the effectiveness of prevention programmes. These results have important implications for the design of universal psychoeducational interventions in which the balance between inclusiveness and sensitivity to existing gender differences is maintained.
Short CV
Professor of Developmental Psychology in the Department of Developmental and Educational Psychology at the University of Seville. She has a wide experience in the study of interpersonal relationships in childhood and adolescence, where she has deepened in the study and prevention of bullying, sexual violence and violence in adolescent couples. She has participated in several European projects on the subject and has directed national research projects developing and evaluating programs for the prevention of violence in adolescent couples and publishing the results of these works in international journals and national and international books. She is currently directing several national projects for the prevention of sexual violence and other forms of violence in adolescence. She is a member of the IASED research group at the University of Seville.