The current study examined whether adding emancipatory sexuality education, which encourages the exploration of women's own sexual values and desires, to a sexual assault resistance program would improve women's resistance to sexual assault by known men. The participants were 214 first-year university students. A randomized experimental design…

The purpose of the study was to assess sexual assault survivors' nondisclosure motivations, including stigma threat, and their impact on revictimization risk. The authors describe data from a prospective study of 144 female, undergraduate sexual assault survivors, most of whom had been assaulted by acquaintances and only one of whom had officially…

Sexual assault is associated with a number of health risk behaviors in women. It has been hypothesized that these risk behaviors, such as hazardous drinking, may represent women's attempts to cope with psychological distress, such as symptoms of depression and anxiety. However, extant research has failed to evaluate these relationships among…

The current study extends the development and evaluation of an existing and previously evaluated sexual assault risk reduction program with a self-defense component for college women (N = 300). The program protocol was revised to address psychological barriers to responding assertively to risky dating situations, and a placebo-control group was…

Heavy alcohol consumption (Testa & Parks, 1996) and childhood sexual abuse (CSA; Messman-Moore & Long, 2003) have been associated with adult sexual victimization. We examined the social behavior of 42 women under two alcohol conditions (high dose and low dose) in a bar laboratory. Women were videotaped interacting with a man they had just met.…

Research has consistently found that a history of previous sexual victimization increases risk for future sexual assault, which might be due to women with a history of sexual victimization having difficulty identifying risky cues and not perceiving their own vulnerability for future assaults. This study investigated how acknowledgment of previous…

The present study evaluated the efficacy of a sexual assault risk-reduction program that included a physical self-defense component for college women ("N"=500). Program group women significantly increased their protective behaviors over the 6-month follow-up period compared to the waiting-list control group. However, there were no significant…

Examined the role of alcohol and dating risk factors for sexual assault among a representative sample of 1,160 female undergraduate students. Findings show over half experienced a sexual assault, with about 95% of these assaults being from someone they knew, and almost half of these involving alcohol consumption either by the man, the woman, or…

In a longitudinal study, risk characteristics were examined over 32 months for 100 women in an effort to identify predictors of sexual victimization in college dating. The best prediction model contained only two variables: precollege victimization in dating was positively correlated with college victimization, and sexual conservatism was…

Investigated how 165 female college students appraised their sexual assault risk in hypothetical dating situations, varying male partner characteristics and the consumption of alcohol. Findings suggest that women are partially accurate in making sexual-assault risk appraisals, and thus may benefit from rape prevention education that specifically…

Conducts a prospective analysis of sexual assault for 857 college women to assess pathways through which victimization experiences become linked. History of child and adolescent sexual victimization experiences was determined for adult victims and nonvictims. Results indicate that early sexual victimization is a risk factor for adult…