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- Creators: School of International Letters and Cultures
- Creators: Spohn, Cassia
Description
This thesis uses a white paper to outline a plan that Arizona State University (ASU) can implement to better fight sexual assault in the ASU community. This plan focuses on education, training, and reporting tools for both faculty and students to better prevent and respond to sexual assault. This thesis includes a presentation that is to be used in ASU freshman seminar classes for an in person peer to peer educational experience to assure that the majority of the ASU population is educated on ideas about consent and bystander intervention.
ContributorsChange, Imani Simone (Author) / Vega, Sujey (Thesis director) / McGibbney, Michelle (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
Sexual assault is a very serious social issue, one that has recently had a resurgence of interest within the context of college campuses. Studies have shown that the prevalence rates of woman abuse in university and college dating are alarmingly high. Historically, fraternity and sorority members have had a reputation for maintaining what has become known as "rape culture" by creating environments in which underage, binge or competitive drinking and unhealthy interactions and inequality between men and women are the norm. Research suggests this combination contributes to the number of known-assailant sexual assaults on or associated with campus life. The main objective of this project is to identify effective ways to foster an anti-sexual violence and pro-sexual wellness culture within ASU's Greek community by observing and analyzing student interactions with and opinions on these issues. This study aims to examine the attitudes of university students toward sexual assault, to learn how students navigate a culture in which sexual assault exists (the ways they respond to, seek to prevent, and learn about sexual assault). Additionally, this study examines student awareness, accessibility, effectiveness, and reach of current sexual violence prevention initiatives on ASU's campus. After conducting interviews with Greek students and performing direct observation during sexual wellness related events, the researchers of this project have determined that ASU has created an environment in which the student population is sufficiently aware of the sexual assault on campus and definitions of campus, but they are not familiar with nor do they often utilize or suggest that their friends utilize the many resources ASU and the Tempe community provide related to sexual health. Students tend to feel that sexual health programming is informative, but not personally relevant to or engaging to them. Feedback would suggest that the bystander intervention curriculum currently being developed in the ASU Fraternity and Sorority Life office would better address student need for relevant, engaging, and culturally-targeted sexual-health programming.
ContributorsHynes, Braxton Victoria (Author) / Adelman, Madelaine (Thesis director) / Vega, Sujey (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Conducted in collaboration with the Arizona Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence, this project was a pilot survey of representatives at sexual violence organizations in Arizona and a best practices review of sexual violence organizations. It was carried out with the purpose of enhancing ACESDV's knowledge about sexual violence organizations so that the coalition will be able to offer informed and individualized support to these organizations in Arizona as it begins to pursue its new mission of addressing sexual violence.
ContributorsHarrach, Meagan L. (Author) / Bodman, Denise (Thesis director) / Dumka, Larry (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / T. Denny Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
The purpose of this honors thesis is to explain the varying levels of sexual violence against women across time, location and conflicts. Violence against civilians is utilized as an independent variable to measure if the level of violence of a pre-conflict environment widens the space for the exploitation of sexual violence. Women's status is used as an additional independent variable in order to measure if a pre-conflict environment that promotes gender equality moderates the presence of sexual violence as it discourages unequal power dynamics. GDP per capita and population will be used as control variables in order to include consideration of state capacity. Sexual violence will be the dependent variable. In order to statistically measure and depict the relationships between these variables, bivariate correlations and multivariate linear regressions will be utilized. The bivariate correlations showed that as civilian violence increased, sexual violence increased as well, but as women's status increased, sexual violence decreased. The linear regression models found that state actors and rebel groups yielded differing results. For state actors, the increase in women's status failed to moderate the level of sexual violence as an increase in civilian violence and women's status resulted in an increase in sexual violence. However, for rebel groups, an increase in civilian violence and women's status led to a decrease in sexual violence, thereby depicting women's status as a moderating factor. This creates a problem in identifying one or a few factors that predominately lead to an increase in sexual violence; such identification is key for the development of preventative policy.
ContributorsWinans, Sierra Brooke (Author) / Wright, Thorin (Thesis director) / Wood, Reed (Committee member) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
For my honors thesis project in Barrett, the Honors College, I conducted an online college survey that measured student attitudes and perceptions with regard to gender, sexual assault, and domestic violence. In doing so, I also asked students situational questions about their experiences with sexual violence. The research question for the project centered around hidden victims who have been affected by gender-based violence but have yet to report the incident to law enforcement or university officials, despite a number of prominent educational and prevention campaigns on campus and in mainstream media. At the conclusion of the Spring 2016 semester, I received 683 responses from current students at Arizona State University. For the majority of situational questions, 20-30% of individuals answered "yes" to experiencing incidents of sexual violence, many of which focused on if someone had used alcohol/drugs, threats, or physical force to obtain sexual intercourse. For the survey, 11% of women said yes to the question, "have you ever been raped?" Additionally, a significant number of students hesitate to report incidents to law enforcement or university officials because: (1) they were ashamed or embarrassed, (2) wanted to forget it happened, and (3) believed it was a private matter that they wanted to deal with on their own. With this information, university administrators can develop a better understanding of the ASU campus culture as it relates to sexual violence. Additionally, organizational and institutional efforts can be organized and designed to meet the specific needs of our student body with the goal of ultimately reducing the number of sexual assaults that take place.
ContributorsBarney, Emily Marie (Author) / Wright, Kevin (Thesis director) / Spohn, Cassia (Committee member) / School of Public Affairs (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
For 40 years, rape myth scholars have assessed the effects of rape myths on perceptions of and responses to rape, demonstrating that rape myths pose significant barriers to rape prevention efforts and contribute to attrition. Most of this research centers female victims, theorizing rape myths’ relationship to gender stereotypes and how they maintain women’s oppression. However, scholars have largely ignored the relationship between rape myths and race and how rape myths contribute to racial oppression. I used an intersectional framework to reconceptualize rape myths as tools of both gender and racial oppression. I argued that rape myths have race-specific effects on rape perceptions and case processing outcomes, that rape myths contribute to racial disparities that align with racist social hierarchies, and that their influence is structural and systemic. I used three studies to assess these assertions. First, I used a randomized vignette survey to explore how victim and perpetrator race (e.g., White, Black, and Latinx) moderate the effects of rape myths (e.g., “victim precipitation,” “accidental rape,” “women cry rape,” and the “real rape” myth), on victim and perpetrator blame in a hypothetical rape (Chapter 2). Second, I assessed how victim race (e.g., White, Black, and Latinx) moderates the effects of rape myth factors (e.g., victim precipitation, credibility issues, real rape consistency) on police case processing decisions in real sexual assault cases (Chapter 3). Third, I analyzed sex crimes detectives’ descriptions of victims, reports, and decisions to determine how rape myths influence their focal concerns (Chapter 4).
Collectively, findings indicate that rape myths contribute to racial oppression. In Chapters 2 and 3 I found that race moderated the effects of rape myths on rape perceptions and police decisions. Further, rape myths had more negative impacts for Black and Latinx victims, than White victims. Finally, in Chapter 4, I found that detectives use rape myths to evaluate victim credibility, evidence, and case viability, suggesting that rape myths’ influence is structural and systemic. In addition to implications for practitioners, these findings indicate that rape myth scholars should rearticulate rape myths and their effects intersectionally, with particular attention to intersections with race.
ContributorsCoble, Suzanne St. George (Author) / Spohn, Cassia (Thesis advisor) / Stolzenberg, Stacia (Committee member) / Wang, Xia (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022