What Happens When Boys See Peers Hurt Girls

Boys who witness violence are more likely to behave violently.

Source: Photo by Ian Noble on Unsplash

Humans have a nasty habit of violence towards those who are weaker than themselves. That's why every world religion teaches people to protect the weak. And we have made progress. Overall, the world is a less violent place than ever before, yet violence toward women is still common.

What makes the difference between men who will hurt women and men who won’t? A new study finds it all comes down to what teenage boys believe about girls, and whether they witness other teenage boys hurting them.

I don’t know a single parent with a girl who is not afraid for their daughter’s safety. One in 11 female adolescents reported dating violence in the last year, and 1 in 9 reported sexual dating violence.¹ When girls have been the victims of sexual assault, 1 in 3 experience this occurring between the ages of 11 and 17.²

There has been substantial evidence that adult men who believe they are superior to women and who are in a peer group in which violence toward women occurs are more likely to commit violence themselves. But to date, no study has looked specifically at adolescent boys. For this study, the authors wanted to know whether boys with gender-equitable attitudes were less likely to commit violence against girls. They also wondered whether seeing peers abuse girls would impact the boys' behavior.

The Study Methods: The researchers collected data from 866 male adolescents in community settings between August 2015 and June 2017. This randomized control trial looked at boys in 20 neighborhoods classified as lower-resourced in Pittsburgh: “Eligible youth were aged 13–19 years, identified as male, and recruited to participate in a gender-specific violence prevention program.”³

The boys completed two validated questionnaires. The first looked at about attitudes toward gender, i.e. the Gender-Equitable Men Scale. This included rating items like A guy never needs to hit another guy to get respect. The second measured how likely the boys were “to intervene when witnessing male peers’ harmful behaviors toward girls. For instance, participants were asked how likely they would be to intervene if they saw a male peer or friend… telling jokes that disrespected women and girls.”

Finally, the boys reported whether they had witnessed harmful verbal, physical, or sexual behaviors toward women or girls by their peers in the prior 3 months. For example, one item had to do with making rude or disrespectful comments about a girl's body, clothing, or make-up.

Nine months later, the participants answered the questions for the randomized trial. At this point, the boys reported whether they had made someone have sex with them, or whether they had done something sexual with a person too high or drunk to stop them. They also answered questions about sexual harassment in person or online, and about physical violence.

The Findings: Boys who believed that the genders were equal were less likely to perpetrate violence overall. An exception to this was that they were still just as likely as their peers to commit sexual violence against someone with whom they were not in a relationship. Further, boys who witnessed their peers behaving abusively toward adolescent girls were notably more likely to perpetrate interpersonal violence.

Hope for our boys and girls

This is good news. While the existence of violence is always distressing, finding ways to prevent or reduce it is crucial. The study authors highlighted what they saw as an opportunity for prevention: "These strategies include explicitly challenging gender and social norms, while simultaneously working with male adolescents to increase their skills in interrupting peers’ disrespectful and harmful behaviors toward female adolescents.”³

When we teach boys and girls that they are equal and deserving of mutual respect, we prevent violence and abuse. When we teach boys to challenge peers who behave abusively, we empower the community of adolescents to thrive, free from the threat of mistreatment.