Rethinking Alcohol-Related Sexual Assault Among College Students

• In Event: Roundtable: Stigmatization and Victimization in Criminal Justice Environments

Abstract

Alcohol-related sexual assault is recognized as a common problem among American college and university students. This presentation will discuss criminological research on this topic, including both qualitative and quantitative studies of sexual assault and rape. The two main approaches to estimating the incidence or prevalence of sexual assault and rape (Clery Act data on reported sexual assault and climate and other surveys of victimization and perpetration) yield two different pictures of the problem, but converge on several fundamental issues. Recent research has clarified that most perpetrators and victims of sexual assault were drinking at the time of the incident. These and related findings have important implications for criminological research and theory as well as prevention. While avoiding victim-blaming is always essential, preventing sexual violence has to include attention not only to individual student alcohol use but to the traits and activities of colleges that raise or lower the risk of alcohol-related sexual assault.

Author

• George W. Dowdall, St. Joseph's University / University of Pennsylvania