Sexual Violence: Longitudinal, Multigenerational Evidence

Project Summary for 2003-WG-BX-1001 This research will use the National Youth Survey to achieve the following objectives: (1) To study developmental patterns of initiation, continuity, and suspension of engagement in sexually assaultive behaviors in the original respondents; (2) To study sequencing of initiation and suspension of sexual assault relative to other interpersonal violence, other delinquent and criminal behaviors, and potential risk factors for initiation and suspension, in the original respondent generation; (3) To study the prevalence of sexual assault and the comorbidity of sexual assault with other problem behaviors, including other interpersonal violence, (a) developmentally, across the life course, for the focal respondents, (b) intergenerationally, comparing patterns of comorbidity in adolescene and young adulthood, for the original respondents and their children, and (c) including comparisons of comorbidity developmentally and intergenerationally across sociodemographic subpopulations; (4) To study the long term trajectories of adolescent and young adult sexual assaulters as they age into middle adulthood for the original respondents; and (5) To examine the contexts in which the reported sexual assaults (both perpetration and victimization) occurred, including how often the perpetrators were under the influence of drugs and alcohol and the relationship of the perpetrators to their victims. All analyses will be examined comparing results across sociodemographic subpopulations. ca/ncf