Alert Signs of Dating Violence Among College Students: From the Perspective of Campus Services

Abstract

College students represent a vulnerable group for dating violence (DV), as many of them might have few experiences on dating relationships; therefore, they might have limited resolution conflict skills. Researchers have consistently found that both victimization and perpetration of DV have negative consequences on health and well-being, including anxiety, physical injury, and low academic performance. DV in college campuses is a prevalent and complex issue that requires a public health approach to be addressed. Thus, providers of most of the student-oriented services should be engaged in detecting and responding to DV. Although screening for DV in different services (e.g., counseling and health care centers) have been worldwide implemented for many universities, in Costa Rica, it is not a common practice, leading to an inadequate recognition of this problem and therefore failing to address it. Indeed, little is known about the knowledge and ability of professionals offering health and academic services to students to recognize signs of DV. Therefore, this descriptive qualitative study aims to address this gap by identifying the perception of these professionals about alert signs of DV among college students in Costa Rica. Thirtyfive professionals from the five public universities in the country were recruited for this study, including dentists, nurses, counselors, physicians, psychologists, and social workers (age = 44 + 8.5 years old, experience = 6 + 6.3 years working at the university). From a conventional content analysis of the transcription of the interviews, two themes emerged that map the complex interaction among social, sexual, physical, academic, and psychological signs of DV. Results also stressed that warning signs patterns are different between victims and perpetrators, thus screening criteria should consider this difference. Social, psychological, and cybernetic alert signs are the most difficult to recognize, as victims tend to normalize them. Perpetrators are more likely to exhibit strong personalities, while victims are more likely to report low academic performance. These findings might inform to researchers about the constructs that should be included in DV screening instruments for the country. Results might also be used for training academic and health care professionals working on campus services, so they might develop the skills to identify students going through DV experiences.