Is your teenager in danger? 1 in 5 teen girls experience dating abuse in the U.S.

It seems like teenagers nowadays have forgotten what "respect your partner" means. Oftentimes, teenage couples leave one battered and the other selfish. Some even find fulfillment in impeding the rights of other people, and American teenagers have fallen into the hands of the merciless ones who no longer have meaning for the word "respect."

MUNTINLUPA, PHILIPPINES (Catholic Online) - A new study about violence in United States' teenage dating relationships by JAMA Pediatrics has been implemented for the U.S. government's annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey - a veteran in the field of teenage dating violence surveys and studies.

A new question was added to the set of survey questions; it asked the teenagers if they have been forced to engage in sexual activity that they did not want to. According to the 2015 survey, one out of five girls and one out of 10 boys admitted they had been abused at least once during the past year. Most of them also reported they had experienced physical and/or sexual abuse more than once.

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"While female students have a higher prevalence than male students, male and female students are both impacted by teen dating violence," said the study's lead author, Kevin Vagi, a behavioral scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Just like in the case of bullying, the study says that victims, which some are also previous harassers, have the tendency to be suicidal, addicted to drugs and promiscuous.

One question asked the respondents about the kind of physical violence in a dating relationship. They answered differently but there was a common ground such as "being hit, slammed into something or injured with an object or weapon."

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"When was the last time we had a conversation about the importance of consent when it comes to sex, not just the importance of using a condom," an associate professor from Boston University School of Public Health, Emily Rothman said at a protest against the rising violence in dating relationships of teenagers.

"Parents, schools and pediatricians need to ask themselves: Am I talking to the teens in my life about the importance of respect in a dating relationship," she continued. "We need to know more about how to effectively prevent dating violence, not just by doing classroom education about it, but also by working with parents, teachers, clergy, and other professionals who work with youth."

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