College Women’s Perceptions of and Inclination to Use Campus Sexual Assault Resources

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore whether college women’s perceptions of and inclination to use campus sexual assault resources vary as a function of their sexual victimization histories. First, using data from the full sample of female undergraduate students selected from the psychology subject pool ( N = 247), we performed t-tests to analyze whether perceptions of sexual assault as a problem on campus, knowledge of and confidence in campus sexual assault resources, and likelihood of attending a university sexual assault self-defense course differed for victims and nonvictims. Victims indicated significantly less confidence in campus resources and significantly less interest in attending the self-defense course than nonvictims. Second, using data from a subsample of participants ( n = 57) who reported being unlikely to attend the self-defense course, we performed a qualitative analysis of the open-ended responses. Student-reported reasons for not attending the self-defense course were categorized into instrumental barriers such as time and schedule constraints and perceptual barriers such as belief that the self-defense course was unnecessary, with similar response patterns emerging for victims and nonvictims. The results underscore the need for colleges and universities to improve sexual assault service provision for students, especially women with sexual victimization histories.