Effective or Not? Measuring Outcomes of Sexual Violence Primary Prevention Programs

Dispelling a Myth: Reevaluating the Predictive Validity of Rape Myth Acceptance for Likelihood of Engaging in Sexual Violence

“…Some research has cast doubts on the predictive value of rape-supporting beliefs (Gidycz et al, 2007; Harper et al, 2017; Mouilso & Calhoun, 2013), particularly when other variables were included. In fact, some research has indicated that by measuring change in RMA, prevention programs substitute attitudinal change for behavioral change (Holtzman & Menning, 2015; Willis & Germann, 2016). When change in sex-crime behavioral propensity is the goal, developing programs to reduce rape myth endorsement may not sufficiently translate to the desired outcome (and sometimes, may cause some increases in rape-supporting attitudes) in those young men whose risk for perpetration of sexual violence is the highest (Malamuth et al, 2018).…”

“…Anderson & Whiston, 2005;Foubert et al, 2011). Thus, it has been difficult to assess whether greater acceptance of RMA could be used to predict a greater likelihood of sexual violence, or whether stronger predictors of actual sexual violence may exist (Willis & Germann, 2016).…”

“…Furthermore, no known studies have attempted to evaluate all these predictors simultaneously, and comparatively to RMA, so as to identify the strongest combination of predictors. Without such an evaluation, it is difficult to identify the most efficient targets for sexual assault prevention programming (Willis & Germann, 2016), and particularly, to develop programming which affects those young men whose sexual violence proclivity risk is the highest, as recommended by Malamuth et al (2018).…”