The Social Network study identifies how the networks of adults that male youth rely on for support across family, school, and community contexts may confer protection from violence in low resource urban environments. The study leverages existing data, research infrastructure, and community partnerships from Manhood 2.0 and Sisterhood 2.0. These community-based studies were set in Black churches, libraries, and youth-serving agencies that used a “gender transformative” program to promote bystander intervention to reduce the perpetration of sexual violence and adolescent relationship abuse.
Social Network builds upon the research infrastructure, community partnerships, and data from Manhood 2.0 and Sisterhood 2.0 to study how youth teen's networks of adult supports relate to violence perpetration and victimization. Youth and their key adult supports participated in social network surveys, and then dyadic semi-structured interviews were conducted among a subsample of the survey participants. Taken together, results will be used to inform a future intervention that strengthens adolescent-adult social networks to reduce violence perpetration and victimization.