Association between Sexual Victimization History, Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms, and Women’s Decision Making in Risky Social Situations: the Moderating Effect of Ethnicity

A serial Mediation Model of Depression and Drinking Motives Underlying Problem Drinking Among Hispanic College Women Following Rape

Problem drinking and depression are common following sexual assault. The current study applied a coping motives model of drinking and examined the association between rape experiences and problem drinking serially mediated by depression symptoms and coping-depression drinking motives among Hispanic college women. A total of 330 college women were classified into a single rape experience (SGL) group (n = 44), a multiple rape experiences (MLT) group (n = 70), and a no sexual assault experience group (n = 221). Participants completed self-report measures online. Serial mediation analyses with multi-categorical predictors found that significantly increased alcohol consumptions in rape survivors compared to individuals with no sexual assault experience were largely explained by the serially connected underlying mechanisms of depression symptoms and coping-depression drinking motives. The prevalence rates of rape experiences in this Hispanic female sample are alarming, suggesting Hispanic college women as a particularly vulnerable group for rape. The current results contribute to a greater understanding of the effects of rape experiences on behavioral and emotional outcomes among young Hispanic women who have been underrepresented in sexual victimization research. The findings emphasize the importance of assessing depression symptoms and coping-depression drinking motives in Hispanic rape survivors to reduce risks for hazardous drinking behavior.

Why do rape victimization rates vary across studies? A meta-analysis examining moderating variables

Research studies have identified multiple study- and sample-related factors that predict variation in the proportion of participants who report experiences of rape (non-consensual oral, anal, or vaginal penetration obtained by force, threat of force, and/or victim incapacitation). The magnitude of variation introduced by these methodological variables is often unclear, which can complicate attempts to compare findings across research studies. With the goal of identifying and quantifying sources of variation, we conducted a meta-analysis that compared rates of rape experienced by women in the United States during adolescence or adulthood. 6391 research articles were evaluated for inclusion and 84 studies (89 independent samples) met inclusion criteria. Results of a random-effects meta-analysis found that an average of 17.0 % (95 % CI [15.7 %, 18.3 %]) of participants across samples reported experiences of rape in adolescence or adulthood. The mean participant age, source of the sample, perpetration tactics included in the measure, and interaction between sample source and perpetration tactics each predicted significant variation in the proportion of victims identified. Participant recruitment method, publication year, and the earliest age included in the reference period did not predict significant variation. These findings clarify the impact of methodological variables on observed victimization rates and provide context that can inform comparisons across sexual victimization studies.

Women's Response Performance in Sexually Risky Situations: Associations With Disinhibited Sex-Related Alcohol Expectancies

This study evaluated the effects of sexual victimization history, alcohol-related problems, psychological distress, and disinhibited sex-related alcohol expectancies on the effectiveness of women's response performance in hypothetical social situations depicting risk for sexual victimization. Two hundred and forty-five undergraduate women first listened to audiotaped descriptions of the hypothetical social situations and imagined that they were the woman depicted in each scenario. They then were given a response to each situation deemed in prior work by experts in the sexual victimization research area to be effective at reducing risk for sexual victimization and asked to provide each response verbally while being videotaped. Participants then completed measures assessing prior victimization history, alcohol-related problems, psychological distress, and disinhibited sex-related alcohol expectancies. Experts in the sexual violence research area rated participants' responses with respect to how effective each response was in decreasing their risk for having an unwanted sexual experience, defined as an experience in which the woman may be verbally or physically coerced into having a sexual contact of any kind with a man. Structural equation modeling analyses revealed that disinhibited sex-related alcohol expectancies were associated positively with women's response performance, indicating that women who endorsed greater disinhibited sex-related alcohol expectancies provided more effective responses to risky hypothetical situations. Findings suggest possible interventions aimed at reducing women's risk of sexual victimization.

Substance Use, Risky Sex, and Peer Interactions Predict Sexual Assault Among College Women: An Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) Study

Sexual assault is an unfortunately common experience among women in college campuses. This study used ecological momentary assessment (EMA) to gain a better understanding of the contextual determinants of sexual assault among college women. EMA reports inquired about sexual assault experiences, risky sex (sex without a condom and regretted hookups), and substance use (alcohol and cannabis use), as well as what activities participants were engaged in (e.g., pregaming, drinking with peers, and drinking with a casual sexual partner), and whether they experienced peer pressure to engage in casual sex. Participants were 103 freshman undergraduate women (18-24 years old) at a Southwestern university in the United States, who were unmarried, interested in dating opposite-sex partners, engaged in binge drinking (defined as having 3 or more drinks on one occasion) in the past month, and reported at least one experience of sexual intercourse in their lifetime. Participants completed reports (one random and two time-contingent) via EMA three times a day over a 42-day period. Compliance in completing EMA reports was good (84.2% of prompted reports were completed), and time-to-completion of reports once signaled was acceptable (mean = 26 minutes, median = 5.75 minutes). During the 42 days, 40 women (38.8%) reported 75 occasions of sexual assault. The odds of experiencing sexual assault were significantly greater during occasions of regretted hookups and unprotected sex. Additionally, drinking with peers and peer pressure to engage in casual sex were each associated significantly with occasions of sexual assault. Reducing risk for sexual assault among undergraduate women may be possible by targeting these behaviors and contextual features in near real-time via momentary intervention.

Attentional Bias Toward Threat in Sexually Victimized Hispanic Women: A Dot Probe Study

The current study examined attentional bias toward threat in Hispanic college women exposed to lifetime sexual victimization in childhood, adulthood, and both childhood and adulthood. Response latencies and attention bias scores were compared between victimized and non-victimized individuals. Participants were 20 women exposed to adulthood sexual victimization (AS group), 15 exposed to childhood sexual victimization (CS group), 8 exposed to both childhood and adulthood sexual assault (revictimization: RV group), and 20 not endorsing sexual victimization (NS group). They were asked to complete the dot-probe task. The CS group and RV group were combined to create the CS-RV group. Among the AS and CS-RV groups, response latencies were faster when attention was engaged to threat than when attention was engaged to non-threat. The NS group did not demonstrate such differences. When response latencies were compared among the three groups, the CS-RV group had slower response latencies than the NS group. The CS-RV and AS groups revealed similarly significantly elevated bias scores toward threat words than the NS group. Hispanic college women exposed to lifetime sexual victimization display elevated levels of attention bias compared to non-victimized women. Further, the current findings align with an integrative cognitive model for explaining maladaptive informational processing in trauma victims.

The Role of Social-Interpersonal and Cognitive-Individual Factors in Cyber Dating Victimization and Perpetration: Comparing the Direct, Control, and Combined Forms of Abuse

The present study examined the relationship linking social-interpersonal factors (interpersonal dependency, social support, social skills), cognitive-individual factors (planning behavior and goal efficacy), and different victimization and perpetration forms of cyber dating abuse (direct abuse, control abuse, and the combination of both abuse types). The responses of 1,657 Spanish university students were analyzed (62.1% females, 37.1% males). The multinomial logistic regression model revealed similarities among the three victim groups and revealed that anxious attachment and lack of social support increased the likelihood of direct victimization, control victimization, and direct/control victimization. Differences were found in the three victim groups for social skills and planning behavior. Perpetration was significantly associated with anxious attachment in the three cyber dating perpetration forms. Differences were also found in emotional dependency, social support, and social skills among direct perpetrators, control perpetrators, and direct/control perpetrators. The results revealed that interpersonal and cognitive factors correlated with cyber dating victimization and perpetration.

Type of Judge Influences Judgments of College Women's Responses to Increasingly Coercive Sexual and Nonsexual Social Situations

Research examining women's ability to respond to sexually risky situations has relied on trait-based measures or experts' judgments to determine the effectiveness of women's responses. To date, no work has examined whether there are differences among relevant judges with respect to these evaluations. As part of a larger study, 100 undergraduate women listened to descriptions of sexual and nonsexual social situations, viewed clips of a male actor making increasingly coercive verbal requests to each situation, provided a videotaped response to each request, and evaluated the effectiveness of their own responses in decreasing risk for sexual victimization. Women's responses were provided to experts in sexual violence research (n = 8) and undergraduate men (n = 107) who also rated their effectiveness. All raters were asked to attend to both verbal and nonverbal behaviors when providing their ratings. As verbal coercion increased across both types of situations, responses were rated by undergraduate women and undergraduate men as more effective, suggesting that responses become more effective as risk increases for a negative outcome. Experts rated women's responses to moderate coercion as being more effective than responses to low coercion but rated responses to high coercion as less effective than responses to moderate coercion. Additionally, experts and undergraduate women rated women's responses to the sexual victimization risk vignettes as more effective than responses to the nonsexual social situation vignettes. In most cases, experts and undergraduate women's ratings were not statistically different from one another; however, undergraduate men rated undergraduate women's responses to both the sexual victimization risk and the nonsexual social situation vignettes as less effective than experts or undergraduate women. This article discusses applications of these findings for future prevention efforts focused on maximizing the effectiveness of women's responses in sexually risky situations.

Isn't It All About Victimization? (Intra)cultural Pressure and Cutural Betrayal Trauma in Ethnic Minority College Women

Cultural betrayal trauma theory proposes that intraracial trauma in ethnic minority populations includes a cultural betrayal that contributes to outcomes, such as symptoms of PTSD (posttraumatic stress disorder; posttraumatic stress symptoms [PTSS]), dissociation, and (intra)cultural pressure. Participants (n = 179) were ethnic minority female college students, who completed online questionnaires. The results revealed that when controlling for age, ethnicity, and interracial trauma, intraracial trauma and (intra)cultural pressure affected PTSS and dissociation. There were also indirect effects of cultural betrayal trauma on outcomes through (intra)cultural pressure. The current study can contribute to clinical interventions that address trauma-related mental health in ethnic minority college women.

Latent Profile Analysis of Alcohol Consumption and Sexual Attitudes Among College Women: Associations With Sexual Victimization Risk

This study used latent profile analysis (LPA) to identify at-risk profiles of college freshman women ( n = 481) using self-reports of alcohol consumption and sociosexuality. Analyses resulted in three profiles labeled low alcohol use-low sociosexuality, high alcohol use-medium sociosexuality, and high alcohol use-high sociosexuality. Baseline victimization predicted latent profile membership. More severely victimized women were more likely to be in the high alcohol-high sociosexuality profile than the high alcohol-medium sociosexuality and low alcohol-low sociosexuality profiles. At follow-up, the high alcohol-high sociosexuality profile had higher mean levels of victimization severity, relative to those in the high alcohol-medium sociosexuality and low alcohol-low sociosexuality profiles.