Primary Prevention and Risk Reduction Programming for College-Level Sexual Assault Prevention: Illustrating the Benefits of a Combined Approach

Abstract

Primary prevention and risk reduction strategies for reducing sexual assault on college campuses have generally been treated as distinct categories of programming, with greater emphasis placed on primary prevention in recent years. The authors propose that there is both theoretical justification and measurable benefit to synthesizing or coordinating carefully constructed primary prevention and risk reduction programming. They provide as support a summary of assessment findings from an exemplary program and discuss implications and future directions for program development and testing.

Gender-based violence on college campuses, especially as it relates to sexual violence, has been receiving national attention in recent years. Calls for comprehensive programming have been put forth by both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 2004) and the American College Health Association (ACHA, 2008), federal initiatives have been put in motion by President Obama (Obama, 2014), and numerous research studies on the efficacy of various prevention programs have been published (Breitenbecher, 2000; DeGue et al., 2014; Vladutiu, Martin, & Macy, 2011). Most of this attention has focused on the benefits of primary prevention programming, which aims to prevent initial perpetration through the promotion of healthy relationships, open sexual communication, and respectful sexual environments. One of the principal goals of these programs is to alter social norms that support sexual assault or change bystander cultures that are complicit in acts of sexual violence.