Many freshman college students consider experimenting with alcohol as a rite of passage. Campus drinking culture, especially in the United States, is a known problem. One survey revealed that almost half of all college students aged 18-22 drank alcohol, and almost 30% had engaged in binge drinking over the previous month.[i]
This campus culture of alcohol experimentation can lead to unfortunate outcomes including death, physical assault, and sexual assault. It is estimated that 1 in 5 female college students will experience sexual assault in college.[ii]
When parents send their children off to college, they often experience a mix of emotions including elation and fear. “Have I done enough to prepare my child for the challenges of college life?” and “Will my child be safe?” are common questions posed by parents. Some experience a feeling of helplessness that their child will no longer be under their supervision. What can parents do to reduce the likelihood of sexual assault that frequently accompanies alcohol experimentation?
In their 2010 study, Testa and colleagues posed the question: can an informal educational intervention from mothers to their daughters directly impact drinking behavior and indirectly reduce sexual assault?
This study focused on mothers and their college-enrolled daughters during their freshman year. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups to allow comparisons of the intervention with no intervention.* Mothers in the two intervention groups received informational handbooks, and they were encouraged to read and discuss this material with their daughters. One handbook contained information about college drinking and general communication techniques. The second handbook combined material from the first handbook with additional information about “sexual refusal assertiveness and partner selectivity” (p. 3).
Participants were assessed longitudinally at 3 different times: baseline (prior to intervention), Time 1 (first semester of college enrollment), and Time 2 (end of second semester). Results of the study showed that mothers in the intervention groups did talk to their daughters about material in the handbooks: mothers reported having an average of 5.77 conversations with their daughters over the course of the study.
The outcome of particular interest was the rate of sexual assault among daughters during the first year of college. The authors predicted that sex assault rates would be indirectly affected by reduced alcohol consumption. Alcohol consumption would be directly impacted by the mother-daughter interventions.
Compared to results for the control groups, the interventions proved successful. The interventions “increased mother-daughter general communication in the first semester of college which in turn predicted less frequent first semester heavy episodic drinking, resulting in lower rates of incapacitated rape and fewer sexual victimization experiences in the first year of college” (p. 10).
Although there were different topics covered in each intervention, the second intervention (alcohol + sex info) was no more effective than the alcohol-only intervention.
These promising results point to the importance of parent-child communication about important topics such as alcohol and sex during the first year of college. These results were obtained after only giving mothers a handbook to read and encouraging them to discuss its contents with their daughters. Could even better outcomes be achieved if mothers are given formalized training before their mother-daughter discussions?
The findings of this study lend support to and expand upon prior research on parent-child interventions to safeguard college students. “Given the strong link between college heavy episodic drinking and alcohol-related victimization observed in this and other studies, interventions that have a significant direct effect on college heavy episodic drinking may result in even larger reductions in college sexual victimization” (p. 11).
Citation: Testa, M., Hoffman, J. H., Livingston, J. A., & Turrisi, R. (2010). Preventing college women’s sexual victimization through parent-based intervention: A randomized controlled trial. Prevention Science, 11(3), 308-318.
©Jennie Dilworth, Ph.D
*Key Study Parameters
Participants: 978 female college freshmen and their mothers
Design: random assignment to 1 of 4 conditions
Conditions: alcohol intervention, alcohol + sex intervention, control, unmeasured control
Measures: alcohol-specific communication, general communication, sexual assertiveness, alcohol use, sexual victimization
Recruitment: randomly selected female high school yearbook photos for years 2004-2007
[i] https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/brochures-and-fact-sheets/college-drinking
[ii] https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/brochures-and-fact-sheets/college-drinking