Are you a high school student who’s looking to find the latest statistics on high school relationship? If so, we have good news: we’ve compiled a list of insightful high school relationship statistics!
We know that it can be difficult to find relevant statistics, especially when it comes to something like dating. But we also know how important it is for you to stay up-to-date with the latest trends and data, so we decided to help by creating this list of stats.
This list will make it easier for you to find the information you need without having to spend hours scouring the internet and trying to sift through all of the clutter. It’s all here in one place—just read on below and get instant access! We’ve also included links to sources so that you can read more about each one.
We hope this list helps you grow as a person and become more involved in your community!
High School Relationship Statistics (Highlights)
- 61% of teens say that they have been in love.
- The median high school relationship lasts 14 months.
- 56% of high school students believe that personality is the most important for being attracted to someone.
- Only 2% of today’s marriages started as a high school relationship.
- 59% of teens believe that social media makes them more connected to their partner’s life.
- 72% of teens text their partners every day.
- 31% of girls between 13 and 14 received flirtatious text messages online that made them uncomfortable.
- 31% of teens report their partners are calling or texting to check up on them multiple times a day.
General High School Relationship Statistics
1. 35% of teens between the ages of 13 and 17 have experience with romantic relationships.
Almost two-thirds, or 64% of teenagers in this age group, say they have never been in a romantic relationship, while 14% are in a serious relationship right now. 16% state that they have been in a relationship before, but are not currently dating.
5% say they are in a relationship now, but they don’t consider it serious, and the remaining 1% refuse to disclose their relationship status. Moreover, teens between 15 and 17 are twice as likely to be in a romantic relationship than 13 and 14-year-olds.
(Pew Research Center)
2. 61% of teens say that they have been in love.
The stats show that male teens are slightly more likely to make this claim, as 64% of boys and 59.6% of girls say they’ve been in love before. However, 94% of teens believe in true love, and the percentages of girls and boys who agree with this statement are equal.
When it comes to love at first sight, though, teenagers are more skeptical, and only 50% of boys and 48% of girls believe it can happen.
Finally, 66% of high school and college students say they’ve had their hearts broken.
(Stage of Life)
3. The median high school relationship lasts 14 months.
Research shows that the age of the students makes a significant difference in how long the average high school relationship lasts.
The average relationship between students in the 12 to 13 age group lasts eight months, while students aged 14 and 15 have relationships that last eight months on average. The average length of high schoolers between the ages of 16 and 20 is 20 months.
(NCBI)
4. 46% of teens say they’ve had a friend “dump them” to hang out with their significant other.
Teenage girls are the more likely victim of this inconvenience, as 51% say this has happened to them, while only 32% of the boys have experienced this. On the other end of the stick, 18% of teenagers who are dating, say that their romantic relationship negatively impacted their relationship with a close friend.
Boys are more likely to say that their friendship suffers at the expense of their romantic relationship, with 23.3%, while only 16.3% of the girls agree with this statement.
(Stage of Life)
5. The percentage of 12th graders who had gone on a date between 2010 and 2016 was 63%.
The statistics show that the above percentage is similar to the share of 10th graders that went on dates in the 1990-to-1995 period.
Additionally, while 54% of the high school students in the 9th-to-12th grades had sex in 1991, the share of sexually active high schoolers in the same grades in 2015 was only 41%.
(SRCD)
6. 62% of the 12th graders in the period between 2010 and 2015 had a sexual experience.
In comparison, their percentage was considerably higher at 68% in the years between 1990 and 1994.
This trend of decreased sexual activity in the more recent years is constant between high schoolers from every grade. 52% of 11th graders from the early 2010s vs. 59% from the early 1990s, 40% vs. 47% for 10th graders, and 29% vs. 38% for the 9th graders.
(SRCD)
High School Relationships and Marriage Statistics
7. 19.8% of teenagers aged between 15 and 17 were married in 1980.
The trend of young people getting married before even reaching adulthood started to significantly decrease at the beginning of the 1990s. Nowadays, marriage between teenagers is much less prominent.
The average age at which women get married for the first time has increased from 24 in 1990 to 26 in 2020. The average first-marriage age for men has increased from 28 in 1990 to 31 in 2020.
(CDC, Census)
8. Only 2% of today’s marriages started as a high school relationship.
Despite that fact, 25% of women claim that they are married to their first love. What’s more, 54% of the high school couples who got married in their teens get divorced within the first ten years of their marriage.
In contrast, 78% of the high school sweethearts who waited until they were at least 25 before getting married don’t get divorced within this time frame.
(Huff Post)
9. Only 6% of women and 2% of men get married before they turn 18.
This figure is an average over the entire population, however, and it’s important to keep in mind that different demographic groups have different probabilities of getting married at a young age.
This statistic is interesting because it shows us how low the probability of marriage is among young people. It’s also interesting because, while more women than men are getting married in their youth, that number still isn’t very large.
(CDC)
10. Teens who date in high school are more likely to get married or start living together by the time they are 25.
We know that there are many factors that influence whether a person will get married or start cohabiting, but this study suggests that starting a serious romantic relationship in high school is one of them.
The study, conducted by researchers at the University of Texas, found that youth who had a serious romantic partner in high school were more likely to get married or start cohabiting by the age of 25.
The results were based on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, which tracked 4,911 high school students.
(Wiley)
11. 92% of high schoolers say they would like to get married at some point.
The portion of male students who say they want to get married is 97%, considerably larger than 90% of the girls who say the same thing. However, boys and girls have an aligned opinion over the ideal age to get married, and both groups select the 24 to 26 age bracket as the perfect time to do it.
(Stage of Life)
Statistics on High School Relationship Break-Ups
12. 62% of the teens who have been in relationships have broken up with someone in person.
While this is the most common way for teens to end their romantic relationships, 29% have done it over the phone and 27% through text messages. 15% didn’t do anything and just drifted away from their partners, and 6% sent them a private message on social media.
In addition, teens have used social media to end relationships in a few different ways. Namely, 6% just changed their relationship status, 4% posted a status update, and 2% just posted an image on social media to let their partners know it was over.
20% of the teens with romantic experience have never broken up with anyone.
(Pew Research Center)
Additionally, 30% of them have untagged or deleted photos of themselves and their ex from their social media accounts.
The percentage of girls who say they have done this is considerably higher. 44% of teenage girls have blocked or removed their ex, while 46% have untagged or removed photos with their ex from social media.
(Pew Research Center)
High School Relationships and Social Media Statistics
14. 76% of the teens with relationship experience say they met their partner in person.
Only 24% say that they date someone they met online. However, 31% of these teens also indicate that they never met their partner face to face and only date them online. This means that 3% of all teenagers have an online-only relationship with a partner they have never met in person.
(Pew Research Center)
15. 70% of teens feel closer to their partners because of exchanges they had online or by text.
Another 48% resolved a problem online or through texting, they had difficulty solving it face to face.
However, in addition to being helpful, digital tools can also raise new issues between teen partners, as 43% believe that their significant other is distracted by their cell phone when they are together.
Additionally, 33% say their partner has done something online that was upsetting to them.
(Pew Research Center)
Furthermore, 47% of teens consider social media a place where they show their significant other they care for them, and 44% feel emotionally closer to their partner thanks to it.
On the other hand, 27% of them say that social media makes them jealous and unsure of their relationship.
(Pew Research Center)
17. Talking in person and flirting is the most common method of showing romantic interest for 55% of teens.
Following or befriending the person they are interested in on social media is the first step toward showing interest for 50% of teens. 47% say they would like or comment on the content they are posting, and 46% say they would share something funny with them to let them know they are interested.
31% of teens say they would send a flirtatious message, and 11% would create a music playlist and send it to the person they are interested in.
(Pew Research Center)
18. Only 35% of teenage girls would ask someone they like on a date in person.
The majority of them, or 47%, would wait for them to ask them first. The remaining 20% would send them a text message rather than talking to them face to face.
69% of boys, on the other hand, say they would ask the person they like on a date in person, and 27% would do it through a text message. Only 6% of boys say they would wait for the other person to ask them out.
(Pew Research Center)
19. 72% of teens text their partners every day.
Another 39% say they speak with significant others on the phone daily. Only 21% of teens meet their partners in person on a daily basis and the majority of them, or 40%, do it every few days instead.
Other common ways of spending time with their partners are social media interactions, instant messaging, and video calls. Interestingly, 6% of teens say they send emails to their partners every day.
(Pew Research Center)
Statistics on High School Dating Violence
20. Close to 1.5 million high school students are getting physically abused by their partners.
Moreover, one in every three teenagers is physically, sexually, verbally, or emotionally abused by their romantic partners.
(Chop)
21. 31% of girls between 13 and 14 received flirtatious text messages online that made them uncomfortable.
The percentage of girls in the 15 to 17 age bracket who experienced this is even higher at 38%. Boys are considerably less likely to be exposed to such experiences. 11% of the 13 and 14-year-olds and 19% of the boys in the 15 to 17 age group say this has happened to them.
(Pew Research Center)
22. 31% of teens report their partners are calling or texting to check up on them multiple times a day.
They say their partners do this to find out where they are, who they are with, and what they are doing.
Another 22% say that their partners called them names and said other mean things to them over the phone or on the internet. In addition, 21% say their partners have read their texts without permission, and 16% say their partners forced them to remove their exes from social media.
Finally, 15% of teenagers say their partners tried to force them to engage in sexual activity they don’t want over the internet or on the phone.
(Pew Research Center)
23. 36% of teens admit to sending their exes a large number of texts in a short period of time.
11% say they’ve gained unauthorized access to their ex’s phone or social media account, and 10% say they’ve pretended to be their ex and messaged other people.
Even more shockingly, 4% of teens admit to downloading a tracking app on the phones of their ex without them knowing.
(Pew Research Center)
Conclusion
Thank you for reading our article on high school relationship statistics. In it, we broke down some of the most commonly-asked questions about relationships and provided answers based on the statistics we collected.
We hope that this information has been helpful to you in some way, and that you will continue to use it as a resource as you navigate your own relationship journey.
We would also like to remind readers that while these statistics reflect trends among high school students, they may not necessarily apply to other age groups or circumstances. So always remember to speak with your parents or educators if you have any doubts about whether or not a given relationship is appropriate for you or someone you know.
It is never too late to develop lasting relationships; all it takes is a bit of effort and hard work. Be yourself, and be accepting of your partner’s quirks – this will help to create the foundation for a long-term partnership.
21 Teenage Dating Statistics That Will Make You Cringe
451 Dating Blog Name Ideas to Tempt Potential Visitors
14 Lovey-Dovey Age Gap Relationship Statistics
30 Relationship Failure Statistics (Too Tough To Accept)