Examining the effects of drinking and interpersonal protective behaviors on unwanted sexual experiences in college women

"BLURRING THE LINE:" INTOXICATION, GENDER, CONSENT AND SEXUAL ENCOUNTERS AMONG YOUNG ADULTS

Social concern about sexual practices and sexual consent among young adults has increased significantly in recent years, and intoxication has often played a key role in such debates. While many studies have long suggested that alcohol plays a role in facilitating (casual) sexual encounters, intoxication has largely either been conceptualized as a risk factor, or researchers have focused on the pharmacological effects of alcohol on behaviors associated with sexual interaction and consent. To date little work has explored how young adults define and negotiate acceptable and unacceptable levels of intoxication during sexual encounters, nor the ways in which different levels of intoxication influence gendered sexual scripts and meanings of consent. This paper explores the latter two research questions using data from 145 in-depth, qualitative interviews with cisgender, heterosexual young adults ages 18-25 in the San Francisco Bay Area. In examining these interview data, by exploring the relationship between intoxication and sexual consent, and the ways in which gender plays out in notions of acceptable and unacceptable intoxicated sexual encounters, we highlight how different levels of intoxication signal different sexual scripts. Narratives about sexual encounters at low levels of intoxication highlighted the role of intoxication in achieving sexual sociability, but they also relied on the notion that intoxicated consent was dependent on the social relationship between the partners outside drinking contexts. Narratives about sexual encounters in heavy drinking situations were more explicitly gendered, often in keeping with traditionally gendered sexual scripts. In general we found that when men discussed their own levels of intoxication, their narratives were more focused on sexual performance and low status sex partners, while women's and some men's narratives about women's levels of intoxication were focused on women's consent, safety, and respectability. Finally, some participants rely on 'consent as a contract' and 'intoxication parity'- the idea that potential sexual partners should be equally intoxicated - to handle relations of power in interpersonal sexual scripts. Since these notions are sometimes deployed strategically, we suggest that they may serve to "black-box" gendered inequalities in power between the parties involved.

What Are the Chances? Perceived Risk of Sexual Victimization for Self and Others Among College Women

Awareness of vulnerability to a negative outcome is considered a necessary first step to risk reduction and prevention behaviors. Accordingly, sexual assault awareness programs have sought to inform college students of the prevalence of college sexual victimization and the risk factors that contribute. The goal of the current study was to consider the degree to which incoming college freshman women recognize their risk of experiencing sexual victimization and to examine whether risk factors such as alcohol use contribute to those perceived chances. Freshman women (N = 252) were recruited via email early in the Fall semester to participate in an online survey. As expected, women perceived their own chances of sexual victimization (21.4%) to be lower than those of the average freshman at the same university (43.7%). Prior sexual victimization, typical drinking, and expected hookups predicted higher perceived risk of being victimized. Only prior victimization predicted higher perceived risk of sexual victimization for others. On average, freshman women acknowledge their substantial risk of experiencing sexual victimization during their first year of college and overestimate the chances that others will be victimized. Findings show high awareness of sexual assault and its risk factors among college students but point toward a need for prevention that goes beyond education and awareness campaigns.

Effects of Typical and Binge Drinking on Sexual Consent Perceptions and Communication

Young adults frequently engage in sexual activity after consuming alcohol and, consequently, may try to communicate sexual consent while intoxicated. We aimed to assess how people's drinking behaviors relate to their consent perceptions and communication with their current sexual partners. Using aggregated data from a 30-day daily diary study, young adults (n = 86, 77.9% women, 86% in a monogamous relationship) reported instances of partnered sexual activity and their perceptions of whether that activity was consensual. For each partnered sexual event, participants reported what they said or did to perceive the sexual activity as consensual. Responses were coded as active consent communication (i.e., using verbal or nonverbal cues) or tacit knowledge (i.e., using context to understand consent). During an exit survey, participants retrospectively reported how many days they drank (i.e., typical drinking) during the 30-day study and whether they binge drank. Typical and binge drinking were associated with identifying sexual experiences as consensual. Participants who binge drank relied less on active consent communication and more on context compared with those who did not binge drink. Young adults who binge drink may rely more on tacit knowledge because alcohol impedes their ability to process complex stimuli-such as active consent cues.

Understanding the Role of Alcohol, Anxiety, and Trait Mindfulness in the Perpetration of Physical and Sexual Dating Violence in Emerging Adults

This study examines alcohol consumption, anxiety, trait mindfulness, and physical and sexual dating violence aggression (PDV and SDV) among 735 emerging adults (18-25 years) in an urban emergency department. Of the total sample, 27.2% perpetrated PDV and 16.5% perpetrated SDV. Alcohol was positively associated with PDV/SDV. Anxiety was positively associated with PDV. Mindfulness was negatively associated with PDV/SDV. Interaction analyses revealed women had lower PDV with higher nonjudgment facet of mindfulness. Higher act aware was associated with lower PDV regardless of high versus low alcohol. Findings indicate different contributing factors among perpetrators of PDV/SDV; some factors may be attenuated by mindfulness.

Reduced nicotine content cigarette advertising: How false beliefs and subjective ratings affect smoking behavior

INTRODUCTION

Tobacco advertising can create false beliefs about health harms that are reinforced by product design features. Reduced nicotine content (RNC) cigarettes may reduce harm, but research has not addressed advertising influences. This study examined RNC cigarette advertising effects on false harm beliefs, and how these beliefs - along with initial subjective ratings of RNC cigarettes - affect subsequent smoking behaviors. We further explored whether subjective ratings moderate associations between false beliefs and behavior.

METHODS

Seventy-seven daily, non-treatment-seeking smokers (66.2% male) participated in the first 15days of a randomized, controlled, open-label RNC cigarette trial. Participants viewed an RNC cigarette advertisement at baseline before completing a 5-day period of preferred brand cigarette use, followed by a 10-day period of RNC cigarette use (0.6mg nicotine yield). Participants provided pre- and post-advertisement beliefs, and subjective ratings and smoking behaviors for cigarettes smoked during laboratory visits.

RESULTS

Viewing the advertisement increased beliefs that RNC cigarettes contain less nicotine and are healthier than regular cigarettes (p's<0.001 and 0.011), and decreased the belief that they are less likely to cause cancer (p=0.046). Neither false beliefs nor subjective ratings directly affected smoking behaviors. Significant interactions of strength and taste ratings with beliefs (p's<0.001), however, indicated that among smokers with less negative initial subjective ratings, greater false beliefs were associated with greater RNC cigarette consumption.

CONCLUSIONS

Smokers may misconstrue RNC cigarettes as less harmful than regular cigarettes. These beliefs, in conjunction with favorable subjective ratings, may increase product use.