The majority of college women who experience rape do not conceptualize their experience as a victimization, that is, they are unacknowledged victims. There is some initial evidence that unacknowledged victims are at elevated re-victimization risk relative to acknowledged victims. In the current study, we sought to identify mediators of the association between acknowledgment of rape and re-victimization in a sample of 319 college rape victims; 187 (58.6%) participants completed a 2-month follow-up study. We examined regular drinking, number of sexual partners, and continuing a relationship with the assailant as potential mediators of the relation between acknowledgment and re-victimization. At follow-up, unacknowledged victims reported higher rates of new attempted (16.2%) and completed rape (11.9%), relative to acknowledged victims (attempted: 7.9%; completed: 3.0%). Number of sexual partners mediated the relation between acknowledgment and attempted rape. Both number of partners and regular drinking mediated the relation between acknowledgment and completed rape. Thus, not acknowledging rape may be associated with re-victimization in part because unacknowledged victims may be more likely to engage in behaviors that increase vulnerability. We believe there is a need for longitudinal, theoretically grounded research examining risky behaviors, victimization, and acknowledgment status over time to delineate the relations among these variables.

Objective:The Sexual Experiences Survey-Revised (SES-R) is considered the "gold standard" for screening for sexual victimization experiences in adults. However, research studies examining the psychometrics of this instrument are scant. This article examines response consistency among individuals endorsing a sexual victimization history on the SES-R, as well as examines the extent to which the SES-R yields true and false positives. Method: A total of 1,263 college students completed the SES-R victimization items online for course credit. A total of 189 individuals who endorsed having a sexual victimization history on the SES-R completed the measure online again after a period of 1-4 weeks, as well as provided a written description of their sexual victimization experience. Results: Consistency in responses to the SES-R was overall moderate ( s ϭ .33-.69). Examination of the written descriptions provided suggested that 79.7% of endorsements on the SES-R reflected true positives and 20.2% represented false positives. However, agreement regarding the type of sexual victimization experienced between responses on the SES-R and written descriptions was moderate, with the strongest level of agreement among individuals who endorsed a completed rape history on the SES-R (60%). Conclusions:The SES-R is a useful tool for screening for sexual victimization history, but caution should be exercised when inferring both overall victimization rates as well as specific types of victimization based on SES-R responses alone. Several modifications to the SES-R item content and administration format could potentially reduce problems with response inconsistency and false positives.

Past research has categorized the rape experiences of women attending college into types primarily based on perpetration tactics and/or survivor substance use. However, this practice may overlook key differences. Therefore, in the current study, we sought via latent class analysis (LCA) to identify types of rape using multiple assault characteristics, including survivor resistance and substance use by the survivor and perpetrator. Participants were 344 college women who experienced rape since age 14 who completed an online survey. A five-class rape typology model was the best-fit: (a) Combined force/substance-facilitated rape (16.0%), (b) Substance-facilitated rape, congruent drinking (18.0%), (c) Substance-facilitated rape, non-congruent drinking (14.0%), (d) Low force/resistance rape (25.0%), and (e) Forcible rape (27.0%). Classes differed in acknowledgment, perpetrator relationship, current psychological distress, and recent hazardous drinking. Findings showed that college women’s rape experiences fell into several distinct typologies on the basis of the presence of force/resistance as well as survivor and perpetrator substance use/substance-related impairment. Practitioners working with college rape survivors should be mindful of how multiple assault characteristics may affect survivors’ recovery trajectory. Future research should further investigate the implications of these rape typologies on adjustment, recovery, and re-victimization risk among survivors.

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Unacknowledged rape, labeling a rape as a nonvictimizing event, remains largely unstudied among non-college women. This study therefore sought to examine differences in assault characteristics, adjustment, and disclosure by rape acknowledgment status among a sample of lower income rape victims (n =104) recruited from a reproductive health clinic (mean age = 28.8 years). Although unacknowledged rape was infrequent (17.1% of victims), unacknowledged victims reported that the perpetrator used less force and were less likely to have assertively resisted, as compared to acknowledged victims. There were no significant differences in disclosure, depression, and somatic complaints between unacknowledged and acknowledged rape victims. Implications of the findings for understanding rape acknowledgment and postrape adjustment among community women are discussed.