How Community and Peer Perceptions Promote College Students’ Pro-Social Bystander Actions to Prevent Sexual Violence

Abstract

The prevalence of sexual violence crimes on U.S. college campuses is prompting institutions of higher education to increasingly invest in centers to support survivors and programs to prevent the violence before it happens. Understanding bystanders to sexual violence and what may motivate them to step in and help is a promising prevention strategy. The purpose of this study was to understand how potential active bystanders' (first-year college students) perceptions of community (including a sense of one's influence in the community and positive peer norms for helping) and individual beliefs about self (including sense of responsibility and self-efficacy) affect their self-reports of performing bystander behavior to address sexual violence risks. Participants were 948 students at two different universities (one a rural, primarily residential campus and the other an urban, mostly commuter campus) in the northeastern United States. Regression and path analysis quantitative results suggest that individual-level characteristics may mediate some of the impact that community-level norms and perceptions have on bystander outcomes, explaining some of the mixed findings in previous research. Prevention strategies should work to change community norms and perceptions of mattering and perceptions of community influence in addition to the more traditional focus on individual-level violence specific attitudes.

Magnitude of Gender-Based Violence and Its Associated Factors among Female Night Students in Bahir Dar City, Amhara Region, Ethiopia

“…This finding is consistent with the studies in Harar town, eastern Ethiopia, and World Health Organization (WHO) reports [29,39]. The supporting study states that adolescence is the time when a person is most susceptible to peer pressure because peers become an important influence on behavior during adolescence, and peers are engaging in similar behavior [40,41].…”

Comprehensive Prevention of Campus Sexual Violence: Expanding Who Is Invited to the Table

“…In fact, recent research by Coker et al (2016, 2017) indicates that those high schools, colleges, and universities that have bystander programs present have lower rates of sexual violence victimization and perpetration. What is more, students’ perceptions that they have influence on their campus are related to greater bystander intervention (Banyard, Rizzo, Bencosme, Cares, & Moynihan, 2018).…”

“…For example, Potter, Stapleton, and Moynihan (2008) have published a number of studies indicating the effectiveness of social norms marketing across campus as a form of prevention. Other scholars have highlighted the importance of a sense of community on campus and perceptions of having influence in the community in promoting a sense of responsibility and caring for one another (Banyard, Edwards, & Siebold, 2017; Banyard et al, 2018; Edwards, Mattingly, Dixon, & Banyard, 2014). Consideration of both the informational and physical environment on campuses have been raised as issues that need further exploration as well (McMahon, 2015), which is consistent with WSA frameworks in fields such as bullying and violence prevention in high schools that emphasize the importance of identifying “hot spots” where victimization may occur, as well as considering the presence of monitors (both human and mechanical) to limit opportunities for aggression and promoting positive behavioral expectations through messaging (Astor, Meyer, & Pitner, 2001; Taylor et al, 2013).…”

Sexual violence in Indonesian University: On students’ critical consciousness and agency

“…The university structure did not support the anti-sexual violence narrative, and it did not support the growth of student agency on sexual violence issues. This essential element might be used to understand the institutional norms and perceptions used to design sexual violence prevention strategies (Banyard, Rizzo, Bencosme, Cares, & Moynihan, 2021). It even perpetuated and normalised the sexual violence incidents on campus by indirectly defending the perpetrators and neglecting the survivors.…”