Criminological explanatory approaches for attitudes to sexuality and violence among adolescents and young adults : A Secondary Analysis of the “SchutzNorm Study” in Germany from 2021

Abstract: According to the Federal Centre for Health Education, over 50 % of all adolescents and young adults in Germany have experienced non-physical sexualized violence. Although it has been studied, reasons for committing sexual violence are not so obvious and variables such as socioeconomic status have been found not to be valid predictors of this kind of deviant behaviour. Studies show that girls are mainly victimized by men and men are equally victimized by both genders. Furthermore, a cognizance is that nowadays adolescents get their information on how to behave in sexual acts from the internet. Women are mainly using advice pages and consulting offers whereas men in comparison are using internet pages like Wikipedia or watching porn. The aim of the current study is to find some criminological explanatory approaches to attitudes to sexuality and violence among adolescents and young adults. The main findings are that a person who is inclined to violence in general and lives in an environment where sexual violence often occurs is more likely to have the attitude that violence as a component of sexual acts is not considered a boundary violation.  Likewise, the likelihood increases to see violence as part of sexual acts not as a violation of boundaries if the attitude is in favor of consuming pornographic material in groups.