“We need to step up and step in”: Sexually Aggressive Behaviours and How Perpetrators Avoid Intervention When Witnesses are Present

(Photo provided by Kate Metcalfe)

“I spent two years working in residence as a proctor, which allowed me to talk to students of all genders who experienced sexual violence at some point in their lives. From hearing their experiences, there arose a need to understand why so many assaults occur, and why so few perpetrators are held accountable.” ~Kate Metcalfe

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*In the following interview, TS refers to The Synapse and KM refers to Kate Metcalfe;

TS: Could you briefly introduce yourself, your supervisor, the topic of your thesis, and the field it contributes to?

KM: My name is Kate Metcalfe, and I completed an Honours in Psychology with a Minor in Interdisciplinary Leadership! My Honours thesis was supervised by Dr. Lucia O’Sullivan and Dr. Scott Ronis. We investigated sexual assault reports to learn more about sexually aggressive behaviours and how perpetrators avoid intervention when witnesses are present. This project contributes to the field of sexual violence.

TS: What was the inspiration for your study, your research question, and the main results?

KM: I spent two years working in residence as a proctor, which allowed me to talk to students of all genders who experienced sexual violence at some point in their lives. From hearing their experiences, there arose a need to understand why so many assaults occur, and why so few perpetrators are held accountable. Thus, the study aimed to investigate the behaviours bystanders notice perpetrators using to:

 1) enact sexual assault and;

 2) prevent witnesses from stopping their behaviour. 

Our results indicate that perpetrators often use intentional and strategic behaviours to enact sexual assault, including physical force, incapacitation, and verbal coercion. Some also use strategic behaviours to circumvent peer intervention, like making excuses, claiming they are “just joking around,” or getting angry.

We also identified cognitive factors that influence how people interpret potential sexual assault situations. We found that higher bystander self-efficacy significantly predicted stronger bystander beliefs that “ambiguous” social events would lead to sexual assault and necessitated intervention. Rape myth endorsement negatively predicted whether bystanders believed intervention was necessary, but did not predict whether they believed assault would occur. In other words, high rape myth endorsement does not predict the ability to identify a potential assault, but it does predict reports that stopping the perpetrator is not as necessary.

TS: Could you provide a brief summary of the methods/ experimental procedure used in this study?

KM: We recruited 247 participants, aged 19-25 (M = 22.3, SD = 1.95),­ from the crowd-sourcing platform Prolific®. Participants who reported witnessing an assault (n = 99) described the event in detail, including the perpetrator’s specific behaviours and the outcome - if any - of a bystander intervention attempt. Reports were analyzed by conducting a content analysis of open-ended survey responses - a method used to thematically organize qualitative data. 

In addition, all participants (n = 247) completed measures of:

 1) previous sexual assault victimization and perpetration;

 2) bystander self-efficacy to intervene; and 

 3) rape myth acceptance. 

Then, they read ambiguous scenarios invented by our research team depicting potential sexual assault in drinking settings. Multiple linear regression analyses were used to determine how the three measures of participant characteristics influenced:

1) the extent to which participants thought the event would lead to assault; and

 2) whether they believed intervention was necessary. 

TS: Are there any future studies that will be conducted based on your method or results?

KM: Currently, we are preparing these results into two manuscripts to submit for publication! In addition, my supervisors, Dr. O’Sullivan and Dr. Ronis, as well as Dr. Sandra Byers from UNB, and Dr. William McIver Jr. from NBCC, are working on a SSHRC-funded project on individuals who commit sexual assault but remain unidentified. This research is similar to my Honours project in that it aims to investigate intentional sexually aggressive behaviours. I am excited as I have the opportunity to work as a research assistant on this project.

TS: What would you consider the most intriguing part of your research?

KM: Notably, most participants (89%) described a physically forceful behaviour, such as grinding, unwanted touching, forced kissing, or isolation. Past research typically operationalized physical force as extreme behaviours, such as holding someone down or using a weapon; therefore, participants rarely report using physical force when asked about their previous acts of sexual aggression. Our results indicate that perpetrators enact a variety of less severe physical force in earlier social stages to obtain sex from a non-consenting partner.

It is, however, important to note that participants who witnessed more than one event (50% of the sample) were asked to report on the most memorable event they could recall, which increased the probability that more extreme cases would be reported. Still, results indicate that less severe physical force behaviours serve as precursors to actual assaults, and are thus essential to our understanding of sexually aggressive behaviour.

TS: Is there anything else you wish to share about the research experience or study?

KM: Although bystanders were present in all cases they reported, attempts to stop the event only occurred in 57% of these cases. Ultimately, the perpetrator is the only one to blame, but sexual aggression often begins in the presence of bystanders. We need to step up and step in when we see a situation we think might end in sexual assault. We need to check on our peers even if we are unsure if the event will lead to sexual violence: we might be wrong, but what if we are correct and through our efforts, we stop an assault from occurring? I think that this is an important reminder for all of us.

If you have any questions about this research or want to learn more, feel free to email me! kate.metcalfe@unb.ca Ψ

Created for The Synapse by Incé Husain.