This study examines how alcohol and other drug use is related to sexual aggression. It found greater marijuana use predicted sexual aggression even when controlling for alcohol use.
Swartout, K. M. (2007). Relationships between drug use and male sexual aggression across time. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
The findings from this study suggest that college men in tight-knit peer groups who perceive their peers to be hostile towards women are more likely to also have hostile attitudes towards women themselves. Men in non-hostile peer groups had the lowest level of hostility towards women.
Swartout, K. M. (2013). The company they keep: How peer networks influence male sexual aggression. Psychology of Violence, 3(2), 157.
This study investigates how hegemonic masculinity (believing sex is a form of dominance) is related to sexual aggression. It found men with greater hegemonic masculinity were more likely to perpetrate towards an intimate partner in order to maintain dominance.
Smith, R. M., Parrott, D. J., Swartout, K. M., & Tharp, A. T. (2015). Deconstructing hegemonic masculinity: The roles of antifemininity, subordination to women, and sexual dominance in men’s perpetration of sexual aggression. Psychology of men & masculinity, 16(2), 160.
The purpose of this study is to examine which factors influence whether men with a sexual perpetration history starting college are more or less likely to perpetrate in college. Sexual compulsivity, hostile attitudes towards women, rape supportive attitudes, perceptions of peer approval of forced sex, and peer pressure to have casual sex were all related. Meaning, men with increased levels of these were more likely to perpetrate and men with decreased levels were less likely to perpetrate in college.
Thompson, M. P., Kingree, J. B., Zinzow, H., & Swartout, K. (2015). Time-varying risk factors and sexual aggression perpetration among male college students. Journal of Adolescent Health, 57(6), 637-642.
This study attempts to challenge the commonly held belief that the majority of sexual perpetrators on college campuses are serial perpetrators by explicitly asking perpetrators how many people and different days they perpetrated. It found when adding these two questions, the rate of serial perpetrators decreased from 90% to 30%.
Swartout, K. M., Koss, M. P., White, J. W., Thompson, M. P., Abbey, A., & Bellis, A. L. (2015). Trajectory analysis of the campus serial rapist assumption. JAMA pediatrics, 169(12), 1148-1154.
Using a comments on a Reddit post asking perpetrators their recounting of the sexual violence incident, this study looks into what type of content in their recount of the incident is related to them trying to justify their actions. It found men try to justify their actions by discussing sexual script expectations, victim blaming, expressing hostile sexism, endorsing biological sexism, objectifying the victim, and reporting a preference for casual sex.
Hipp, T. N., Bellis, A. L., Goodnight, B. L., Brennan, C. L., Swartout, K. M., & Cook, S. L. (2017). Justifying sexual assault: Anonymous perpetrators speak out online. Psychology of Violence, 7(1), 82
This study assesses how men’s friend groups may reduce men’s sexual violence perpetration. It found men who are active in more social groups were less likely to be sexually violent, and if they do, they commit fewer acts then men with fewer social groups.
Kaczkowski, W., Brennan, C. L., & Swartout, K. M. (2017). In good company: Social network diversity may protect men against perpetrating sexual violence. Psychology of violence, 7(2), 276.
This study examines how men’s behaviors and attitudes related to alcohol, masculinity, and relationships before starting college are related to starting college with a sexual perpetration history. It found men who report higher sexual media consumption, heavy drinking, hypermasculine beliefs, and have friends who normalized sexual violence before starting college were more likely to have a history of sexual perpetration. Conversely, men with greater consent knowledge and stronger family functioning before starting college were less likely to have a perpetration history.
Salazar, L. F., Swartout, K. M., Swahn, M. H., Bellis, A. L., Carney, J., Vagi, K. J., & Lokey, C. (2018). Precollege sexual violence perpetration and associated risk and protective factors among male college freshmen in Georgia. Journal of Adolescent Health, 62(3), S51-S57.
The findings from this study suggest when men recount the time they perpetrated sexual violence, they often express the following emotions: shame, guilt, depression, and anger. These emotions also were related to the details of the incident or men’s attitudes. Expressing shame was most likely in men who were intoxicated and were uncertain about whether they had consent during the incident. Men who expressed guilt were likely to report self-growth after the incident. Expressing depression was most likely in stories where men reported social isolation after the incident; and anger was related to men expressing hostility towards women and denying responsibility.
Brennan, C. L., Swartout, K. M., Cook, S. L., & Parrott, D. J. (2018). A qualitative analysis of offenders’ emotional responses to perpetrating sexual assault. Sexual Abuse, 30(4), 393-412.
The purpose of this study was to assess the ARC3’s utility to assess campus climate for sexual misconduct. The ARC3’s modules on types of sexual misconduct (e.g., sexual harassment, dating violence), campus prevention efforts, resources, resources, empirically-supported predictors and outcomes of sexual misconduct, and overall findings were consistent with previous research.
Swartout, K. M., Flack Jr, W. F., Cook, S. L., Olson, L. N., Smith, P. H., & White, J. W. (2019). Measuring campus sexual misconduct and its context: The Administrator-Researcher Campus Climate Consortium (ARC3) survey. Psychological trauma: theory, research, practice, and policy, 11(5), 495.
