This book provides counselors with a look at the effects of violence and offers strategies for assisting victims and survivors of that violence to cope, recover, and grow. Chapter 1 tells the story of a victim of sexual abuse. Chapter 2 examines the psychodynamics of trauma, including posttraumatic stress. Chapter 3 discusses effective therapies…

Log-linear chi-square analyses were conducted to examine potential interactions between presence of pre-crime Axis I psychiatric diagnoses and differential levels of crime stress in association with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in a community sample of 295 female crime victims. High crime stress was defined as crime that included either…

A general legal definition of rape is sexual intercourse forced on an individual by another against his/her will and overcoming his/her resistance. Although the female is usually referred to as the survivor and the male as the perpetrator, there are cases of male rape. Rape may be divided into stranger rape and acquaintance rape. Types of…

Rape is believed to be one of the most underreported crimes with 3 to 10 rapes committed for every one that is reported. Rape represents an extreme behavior which can be placed on a continuum of sexual aggression defined by degrees of coercion and force. The prevalence of sexual aggression among college students nationally was examined in 3,187…

This paper describes a four-phase therapeutic approach that has proven useful to adult female and male survivors of child sexual abuse. The methods described are primarily used in individual therapy, although the context is within the family therapy realm and relies heavily upon Structural Family Systems Theory. The four phases which a victim…

Physicians and rape crisis counselors may play important roles in assisting a rape victim; their beliefs and perceptions about rape may influence their treatment of the victim. Physicians (N=10) and volunteer rape counselors (N=44) completed questionnaires focused on demographic characteristics, their experiences with rape victims, and personal…

The effects of the victim's emotional style on social reactions to the rape victim are examined. Of specific interest were perceptions of victim credibility, degree to which she would later be socially accepted and the degree to which the observers believed the victim found the rape unpleasant. Subjects (N=55) viewed two videotapes depicting a…

The incidence of sexual assault among 800 randomly selected university women is examined. Four degrees of sexual assault are defined: forceable intercourse, forceable attempted intercourse, forceable petting, and forceable necking. The incidence of sexual assault, the antecedent conditions to the assault, and the type of victim-offender…

Investigated reactions to a woman who presumably had been raped by a stranger or an acquaintance. Undergraduates read one of two rape descriptions prior to watching a videotape of the woman who (they were led to believe) had been the victim of the rape. Females and males showed markedly different reactions to stranger and acquaintance rape and…

The National College Women Sexual Victimization (NCVS) study attempted to build on and surmount the limitations of existing research on the sexual victimization of college students. In addition to the study of sexual victimization, the study investigated how rape estimates that use the two-stage process of behaviorally specific questions and…

An analysis of structural and institutional violence against women in three cultures in Southeast Asia, Thailand, Cambodia, and among refugees of Burma, was generated by groups of women and men from these countries. Group members also discussed strategies for transforming systems supporting gender-based violence into structures of peace and…

Female and male undergraduates judged impact of the rape experience on victims' psychological adjustment and indicated their likely counseling goals. Results are discussed in terms of popular assumptions about rape victims and sex differences in identification with and empathy for female rape victims. Implications for training are noted. (Author)

This article, based on interviews with women who had both been raped and avoided being raped when attacked, examines the situational circumstances under which women were more likely to be raped, and those under which they were more likely to avoid being raped. (Author/MJL)

Examined accuracy with which rape and lesser sexual assaults were predicted among 2,723 college women. Fourteen risk variables operationalized three vulnerability hypotheses: vulnerability-creating traumatic experiences, social-psychological vulnerability, and vulnerability-enhancing situations. Only traumatic experiences variables clearly…

College students (N=18) wrote scripts about "typical" rape and "typical" seduction. Scripts were coded on 20 dimensions. Results showed that rape and seduction scripts were very different. Most subjects described blitz rape in which woman outdoors was attacked by male stranger. Seductions described were usually indoors and…