When Love is Just a Four-Letter Word: Victimization and Romantic Relationships in Adolescence

For many adolescents romantic life begins as a journey from the social scripts they consumed in books television and movies to fantasized and direct experiences with real partners. This journey from a peer network that eschews romantic ties of any kind to one that encourages them is fraught with uncertainties about how to feel think and act. How do I get someone to like me? Why is everyone going out but me? How can I tell if someone really cares about me? What are these butterflies doing in my stomach? What do we talk about? For most American youth confronting such uncertainties is a central yet challenging part of establishing romantic relationships. For youth who were abused as children or who are victimized in their romantic relationships the task may be particularly difficult. Although it is reasonable to expect that past victimization or victimization in romantic relationships would alter the developmental course of romantic experiences we know remarkably little about the topic. Investigators studying victimization and those studying romantic relationships have had little contact with each other. The goal of this focus section is to help foster an integration of the research on adolescent romantic life with that on victimization. The articles present theory and findings from scholars in the areas of adolescent romantic relationships and maltreatment. (excerpt)