Understanding violence between girls
The increased attention over the past year on social and mainstream media on interpersonal violence between girls is not reflected in official crime statistics. By putting the voices of young women at the forefront, The Lassies are No Feart report aims to increase our understanding of young women in Scotland experiences and involvement in violence, in order to better support them to reach their full potential.
Why violence between girls?
Practitioners at our No Knife Better Life networks were reporting an increased frequency and severity of violence between girls. This is a different story to what the statistics are portraying, therefore we felt that we needed to speak to young girls and woman to hear they're thoughts and perspectives on this. Through our small-scale qualitative research, we interviewed sixteen young woman and four practitioners, who even though lives in different places across Scotland, told a very similar story to each other.
The report details findings in three areas:
- Relationships, support and community
- Perceptions of and influences on violence
- Social media
It recommends funding for larger research of young women and girls’ experiences to explore this further and on a larger, national scale.
Why is a gendered lense to violence needed?
Statistically, boys and men are overrepresented as both responsible for and harmed by violence. This has meant that most prevention work, including our own, has focused on boys and men.
Without a gendered lens, prevention programmes risk masking the specific issues faced by girls and young women and ignoring their experiences.
By therefore acknowledging the lived reality for girls in Scotland in 2024, we are able to better support prevention strategies and programmes.
Reports and Resources
Full Report
Young Person's Report
Practitioner E-learning Module
Peer Education Module
Stage 2
co-design a practitioner toolkit with young women. We hope to launch
this in February 2025!