Sexual Assault Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg: Relationship and Sexual Violence Prevalence in College Students

2017 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 93-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara B. Oswalt ◽  
Tammy J. Wyatt ◽  
Yesenia Ochoa
Author(s):  
Jennifer Beste

This chapter focuses on the particular injustice of sexual violence because it emerged as a dominant theme in students’ reflections on party and hookup culture. If we hope to create a just sexual culture in which all college students are respected and treated as ends-in-themselves, we first need to confront the reality of sexual violence on college campuses. Drawing both on student perspectives and important research studies, this chapter first examines why sexual violence is so prevalent on college campuses and then identifies risk factors that increase the likelihood of victimization and perpetration. Lastly, the author examines the traumatic effects of sexual violence on sexual assault survivors.


2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (20) ◽  
pp. 3071-3089 ◽  
Author(s):  
John D. Foubert ◽  
Ana J. Bridges

Use of pornography is common among adolescents and young adults, with most men and a growing number of women viewing regularly. A vast body of research suggests pornography use is associated with multiple attitudinal and behavioral variables. One of those associations, for both men and women, is higher pornography use is correlated with a lower likelihood of intervening to prevent sexual assault. The present study explored how motives for viewing pornography related to male ( n = 139) and female ( n = 290) college students’ willingness and efficacy to intervene to help prevent a sexual assault from occurring. We found that several motivations to view pornography were associated with suppression of willingness to intervene as a bystander, even after controlling for frequency of pornography use. This study joins others in suggesting an association between pornography use and callousness toward sexual violence.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-144
Author(s):  
Daniel W. Oesterle ◽  
◽  
Leah Giorgini ◽  
Christopher Eckhardt

Experiences of sexual violence are commonplace among individuals within the LGBTQIA+ communities, with more than 63% of sexual and gender minority (SGM) individuals experiencing victimization. Despite high rates of victimization, few individuals experiencing sexual assault seek services post-assault, with even fewer individuals within the LGBTQIA+ community accessing post-assault care. This is further exacerbated when considering the unmet treatment needs of sexual assault survivors and victims, where individuals commonly experience high rates of internalizing (i.e., post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety) and externalizing (i.e., substance use/misuse) symptoms for years after experiencing an assault. Although these experiences occur at alarming rates on college campuses, LGBTQIA+ college students may be more likely to seek services and treatment from off-campus providers for a variety of reasons, including privacy concerns and less rigid stereotypes in how services are delivered. Many college students and community members are unaware of their options for receiving post assault care off-campus and within their local communities. Therefore, in conjunction with the YWCA of Greater Lafayette, this service-learning project seeks to establish and build a relationship with a community-based provider responding to instances of sexual violence within the community. The first goal of this research is to support the YWCA in outreach efforts targeted to LGBTQIA+ victims of sexual assault, to increase awareness of the programs offered by the organization within these communities. The second goal of this research is to provide didactic trainings to community providers responding to sexual violence and assault to be able to more effectively deal with SGM individuals experiencing assault, and reduce the heightened barriers faced by this group in receiving post-assault care. Considerations as to how researchers can employ community-based participatory research frameworks to more effectively serve their local community will be discussed.


2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
RaeAnn Elizabeth Anderson ◽  
Emily Carstens Namie ◽  
Paige K Michel ◽  
Douglas L. Delahanty

Objective: There are many methodological issues in studying sexual violence, including potential framing effects. Framing effects refer to how researchers communicate the purpose of a study to par-ticipants, such as, how the study is advertised or explained. The aim of the current study was to inves-tigate if framing effects were associated with differences in participants’ self-reported experiences of sexual violence and related correlates. Methods: College students (N = 782) were recruited to par-ticipate in one of four identical studies that differed in the title: “Questionnaires about Alcohol,” “Questionnaires about Crime,” “Questionnaires about Health,” or “Questionnaires about Sexual As-sault.” Participants chose one of the four studies and completed measures of sexual violence as well as attitudinal and behavioral measures in randomized order. Results: We found significantly more reports of childhood sexual abuse (33.6% vs. 18.5%), rape (33.9% vs. 21.1%), higher frequency of vic-timization (M = 11.35 vs. 5.44), and greater acknowledged rape for bisexual people (46.2% vs. 0.0%) in the Sexual Assault condition compared to other conditions. There were no differences in sexual violence perpetration or attitudinal or behavioral measures. Conclusion: These results revealed that framing effects, based on the study title, affect outcomes in sexual victimization research. Rape was reported 1.6x more in the “Sexual Assault” condition than in the “Health” condition. It is unclear whether these framing effects reflect self-selection bias or framing related increased reports in the Sexual Assault condition, suppression of reports in other conditions, or a combination thereof.


2021 ◽  
pp. 088626052110163
Author(s):  
RaeAnn E. Anderson ◽  
Emily M. Carstens Namie ◽  
Paige K. Michel ◽  
Douglas L. Delahanty

Objective: There are many methodological issues in studying sexual violence, including potential framing effects. Framing effects refer to how researchers communicate the purpose of a study to participants, such as, how the study is advertised or explained. The aim of this study was to investigate if framing effects were associated with differences in participants’ self-reported experiences of sexual violence and related correlates. Methods: College students ( N = 782) were recruited to participate in one of four identical studies that differed in the title: “Questionnaires about Alcohol,” “Questionnaires about Crime,” “Questionnaires about Health,” or “Questionnaires about Sexual Assault.” Participants chose one of the four studies and completed measures of sexual violence as well as attitudinal and behavioral measures in randomized order. Results: We found significantly more reports of childhood sexual abuse (33.6% vs. 18.5%), rape (33.9% vs. 21.1%), higher frequency of victimization ( M = 11.35 vs. 5.44), and greater acknowledged rape for bisexual people (46.2% vs. 0.0%) in the sexual assault (SA) condition compared to other conditions. There were no differences in sexual violence perpetration or attitudinal or behavioral measures. Conclusion: These results revealed that framing effects, based on the study title, affect outcomes in sexual victimization research. Rape was reported 1.6× more in the “Sexual Assault” condition than in the “Health” condition. It is unclear whether these framing effects reflect self-selection bias or framing related increased reports in the SA condition, suppression of reports in other conditions, or a combination thereof.


Author(s):  
Alison Brysk

In Chapter 7, we profile the global pattern of sexual violence. We will consider conflict rape and transitional justice response in Peru and Colombia, along with the plight of women displaced by conflict from Syria and Central America, and limited international policy response. State-sponsored sexual violence and popular resistance to reclaim public space will be chronicled in Egypt as well as Mexico. We will track intensifying public sexual assault amid social crisis in Turkey, South Africa, and India, which has been met by a wide range of public protest, legal reform, and policy change. For a contrasting experience of the privatization of sexual assault in developed democracies, we will trace campus, workplace, and military rape in the United States.


2021 ◽  
pp. 152483802110302
Author(s):  
Caroline Bailey ◽  
Jessica Shaw ◽  
Abril Harris

Adolescents experience alarmingly high rates of sexual violence, higher than any other age-group. This is concerning as sexual violence can have detrimental effects on teens’ personal and relational well-being, causing long-term consequences for the survivor. Still, adolescents are hesitant to report the assault or seek out services and resources. When an adolescent survivor does seek out services, they may interact with a provider who is a mandatory reporter. This scoping review sought to synthesize the current U.S.-based research on the role, challenges, and impact of mandatory reporting (MR) in the context of adolescent sexual assault. Database searches using key words related to MR, sexual assault, and adolescence identified 29 peer-reviewed articles. However, none of these articles reported on empirical investigations of the phenomenon of interest and instead consisted of case studies, commentaries, and position papers. The scoping review was expanded to provide a lay of the land of what we know about the intersection of adolescent sexual assault and MR. Results of the review indicate that though implemented broadly, MR policies vary between individuals, organizations, and states and have historically been challenging to implement due to this variation, conflicts with other laws, tension between these policies and providers’ values, and other factors. Based on the available literature, the impact of MR in the context of adolescent sexual assault is unknown. There is a critical need for research and evaluation on the implementation and impact of MR policies, especially in the context of adolescents and sexual violence.


2021 ◽  
pp. 155708512110319
Author(s):  
Deborah White ◽  
Lesley McMillan

Police are central to the statutory response to sexual violence, shaping the direction an investigation may take. Evidence provided by victims is also key to the processing of sexual assault cases. From a 2013 comparative qualitative study involving interviews with police officers in one province in Canada ( n = 11) and one region in Scotland ( n = 10) who investigate such cases, we discovered striking unanticipated differences between the two groups in terms of how they perceived victims and the evidence they provide. This paper presents a thematic analysis of these data and considers possible implications and explanations.


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