Fellowship for Dr. Liana Hone: NRSA: Sex Differences in Intoxicated Sexual Interest Judgements and Risk Perceptions

(7) PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Of the millions of women sexually assaulted each year, the vast majority (82%) report being intoxicated at the time of the assault, as are roughly half of all perpetrators (Abbey et al., 2014; Krebs et al., 2015). Frequent heavy and binge drinking are consistently associated with sexual assault victimization (Mouilso & Fischer, 2012) and perpetration (Abbey et al., 2012). Sexual assault has numerous negative consequences, including both physical (e.g., vaginal trauma; unwanted pregnancy; sexually transmitted infection) and psychological problems (e.g., post-traumatic stress disorder; substance abuse; suicide; e.g., RAINN, 2016; WHO, 2012). Thus, understanding the role of alcohol in sexual assault is a vital public health priority. In particular, research is needed that characterizes the proximal mediators and moderators of alcohol's acute effects on decision-making processes related to sexual assault risk. The proposed two-year research project will test sex differences in effects of alcohol on two key risk-related processes, namely, judgments of and objective responses to women's displays of sexual interest (or lack thereof), and perceptions of the risk for sexual assault during interactions between a young man and woman who have been drinking. The proposed research also will evaluate the extent to which key individual difference variables (e.g., sociosexual attitudes; alcohol sensitivity; trait aggressiveness) moderate alcohol's acute effects on these processes. Over two years, one hundred young men and women (ages 21-30) will be recruited to participate in a two-session alcohol challenge experiment, during which they will be asked to judge the sexual interest (SI) of female targets in photographs and to assess the risk for sexual assault in video vignettes (risk perception; RP) both sober and following a relatively large (Males: ~0.85 g/kg; Females; ~0.75 g/kg) dose of alcohol. During these tasks, video recordings of participants' facial emotion displays and recordings of participants' skin conductance will be passively obtained. Aim 1 of the proposed research is to characterize alcohol's effects on men's and women's judgments of female targets' SI, as well as potential moderation of these effects by sociosexual attitudes. Aim 2 of the proposed research is to characterize effects of alcohol on men's and women's subjective and objective RP and the extent to which individual differences in alcohol sensitivity (i.e., the number of drinks required to experience subjective effects of alcohol) moderates these effects. Data bearing on these aims will greatly extend knowledge concerning the sex-specific decision-making processes that previous research has suggested are proximal causes of sexual assault and that are believed to be impaired by alcohol. By extension, the proposed research will have implications for the design of prevention and intervention efforts aimed at reducing sexual assault, particularly the large majority of cases involving alcohol intoxication.