Protective Factors for High School and College Perpetration of Sexual Violence
Lakaysia Smith, University of Central Florida
Julia O'Connor, University of Central Florida
Understanding protective factors for high school and college perpetration of sexual violence, can help prevent such violence from occurring. This paper reviews the existing studies on high school and college sexual violence perpetration protective factors to identify and understand how they are researched. Keywords were used to search for studies related to this topic. After reviewing and analyzing the articles against study criteria developed for this purpose and removing duplicates, nine studies were included in this review. The studies on this topic varied greatly regarding the types of protective factors. The most-reported protective factors were: empathy, impulse control, social support, parental support, peers, and school connections. Given the few studies identified (n=9) for inclusion in this study, the evidence supporting these protective factors is still emerging. The findings from this study indicate that those seeking to prevent high school and college sexual violence by promoting protective factors should focus on these protective factors. In addition, the scant research conducted within this field indicates a lack of understanding on less studied protective factors and how to promote them. Therefore, more research on high school and college protective factors for perpetration of sexual violence is needed.
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