College students who participate in date fighting are more likely to drink alcohol and engage in other health risk behaviors, according to a pediatric researcher at Brenner Children's Hospital, part of Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center.
Robert H. DuRant, Ph.D., and his colleagues' research results were published in the March/April issue of The Journal of American College Health.
"For physicians and other health care providers of adolescents, screening for date fight involvement is an important component of well child care." DuRant said. "Date fighting also tends to cluster with other health risk behaviors, such as illegal drug use and risky sexual behaviors."
Violence among young adults has become a significant public health problem, DuRant said. Previous research has found the percentage of adolescents in grades six through 12 who have engaged in dating violence ranges from 7 to 51 percent, depending on how the researchers define dating violence. In the current survey, dating violence was defined as engaging in a physical fight with a date, girlfriend or boyfriend.
"This definition will result in lower percentages of students who report date fighting," DuRant said. "Also, males will tend to under report being the perpetrator of a date fight, particularly when defined this way."