Effects of Dating on the Performance of Students

For this study, dating violence refers to any intentional sexual, verbal, physical or psychological attack on one partner by the other in a dating relationship. Dating relationships typically emerge in early to middle age adolescence. These relationships are considered as learning experiences on the development of a sense of identity and the ability to establish meaningful intimate relationships that sometimes last for long periods of time and some even end in marriage. For many adolescents, they provide the primary context for experimenting with and expressing through developing sexuality. Thus, the transition to dating also presents a time of heightened vulnerability for adolescents, as limited knowledge and relative lack of experience in negotiating relationships may lead to non-consensual or unwanted sex experiences (Furlong, 2010). More recently, in the field of adolescence sexual health and well being, there has been growing concern about the extent to which adolescent relationships are characterized by violence and sexual coercion. Researchers have carried out studies in different parts of the globe and in New Zealand, approximately 4 out of 10 female students have reported experiencing verbal or emotional abuse. This translates to 44.8% of those who admitted to have had dated their peers in secondary schools. (Franzoi, 2000). According to Jaffe (1992), a recent Canadian study of high school students indicates that fully 24% of female had become victims of forced sexual intercourse by Grade 12. A large scale of United States survey of a school population found that 25% of female students had been victims of rape or attempted rape (Koss, Gidyez & wisniewski, 1987).Widespread adolescent dating violence in Sub-Saharan Africa calls for immediate action, particularly since it is linked to the spread of HIV/AIDS. In Sub-Saharan Africa, studies report that as many as 40%–60% of women and girls have been beaten by intimate partners, and 20%–50 % report having been forced to have sex. More specifically, for adolescents in South Africa, studies show that 20%–50% of young people have perpetrated violence against their boy- or girlfriends, and 4%–11% (females–males) have forcibly involved their partners in sexual act. (Annegret, 2009).
Violence in adolescent dating .relationships is a large scale problem and may result in long-term trauma and psychological problems for the victims. This may even result to suicide, which has now become rampant in Kenya. Other adolescents have also turned psychotic and even stubbed to death those they perceive as competitors in the dating game. These incidents have been reported severally by the Kenyan media ad this while there has been less study of verbal abuse in the context of teen dating relationships, experience in previous preventive programs indicated that these are also important issues to address. Relative to violence among adult intimate partners, violence among the adolescent dating partners remains an understudied phenomenon (Poipoi, 2008). According to Furlong (2010), there are many factors or causes to this phenomenon. One of them is the kind of families that these adolescents are growing up in. single parent families leave the children emotionally unstable, and they become vulnerable to many negative effects like looking for a role model in the wrong place and at the wrong time. This makes the researcher is convinced that there is need to do a thorough study into the causes, effects and working preventive measures to try and curb the problem of violence in dating and intimate relationships among students in secondary school. The area of study will be Kiambu County.