EVALUATION OF A SEXUAL ASSAULT RISK REDUCTION AND SELF-DEFENSE PROGRAM: A PROSPECTIVE ANALYSIS OF A REVISED PROTOCOL

The current study extends the development and evaluation of an existing and previously evaluated sexual assault risk reduction program with a self-defense component for college women ( N = 300). The program protocol was revised to address psychological barriers to responding assertively to risky dating situations, and a placebo-control group was utilized rather than a wait-list control group. Relative to the placebo-control group, the program was effective in increasing levels of self-protective behaviors, self-efficacy in resisting against potential attackers, and use of assertive sexual communication over a 4-month interim. Results also suggested reduction of incidence of rape among program participants over the 2-month follow-up. Implications for future development and evaluation of sexual assault risk reduction programming are presented.     

THE WORK COMPONENTS STUDY (WCS): A REVISED SET OF MEASURES FOR WORK MOTIVATION

The present study, through reanalysis of earlier data and the analysis of data from a new sample, reports on the refinement of the Work Components Study (WCS). An earlier study yielded six scores but the present one suggests that one of them should be broken into two, yielding seven scores. It is shown that the internal consistency of these scores is satisfactory and that the scores are relatively independent of each other. Finally, the utility of the scores is evaluated by showing their relationships with measures of personality, ability, and aspirations.     

EDITORIAL COMMENT: GUEST COMMENTARY

A pervasive problem faced by children in both classroom and clinic is the lack of transfer from the apparent learning of “skills” to improved overall reading performance. For varied reasons, “skills” learned by children fail to become integrated to enhance reading fluency. A related problem derives from the lack of automaticity that many children fail to achieve either in specific facilitating “skills” or in the reading task generally.